Virtual Necrophilia

Whilst 'Brucesploitation', (to continue last week's post on the subject), from the perspective of the twenty first century, might seem an extreme and bizarre phenomenon, we in the west aren't immune from similar attempts to resurrect dead idols.  Just look at the number of biopics produced by Hollywood, focusing on the lives of various past stars, recreating parts of their lives in detail (albeit not always accurately - shades of 'Brucespoitation').  While this might be understandable, after all, there are also plenty of biopics of historical figures from politicians to saints, there is something obsessive about these celebrity portrayals.  They rarely stand alone as artistic pieces, more often than not riding on a wave of cult-like fandom for their subject.  You can't help but suspect that there is some hope among fans that this recreation of their idol on screen can somehow create some kind of actual resurrection.  Just like 'Brucespoitation' though, these exercises are about resurrecting the image rather than the person, fueled, in part, by a desire to see their adventures continue, if only by proxy. 

Some of these recreations, however, seem designed to enact some kind of fantasy associated with the real person.  Take, for example, the film The Rocketeer, in which Timothy Dalton plays a character clearly modelled upon Errol Flynn, who turns out to be a Nazi sympathiser.  This is clearly an enactment of a long discredited and completely unfounded series of claims about Flynn's alleged political sympathies, (a reading of Flynn's autobiography, My Wicked, Wicked Ways, not to mention his involvement in the film Cuban Rebel Girls, would suggest that his sympathies, to the extent that he actually had any real interest in politics, tended to lie in the opposite direction).  Another film including a thinly veiled Errol Flynn is, of course, My Favourite Year, in which Peter O'Toole's Flynn surrogate also perpetuates popular, yet not entirely accurate myths abut the late movie star.  In this case, however, the myths are more benign, playing out as an exaggerated version of his hell raising ways.  Likewise, films about the 'rat pack' will usually play to the established stereotypes and 'received wisdom' about the characters: Sinatra is inevitably the crooner troubled by his Mafia connections, Dean Martin the amiable drunk and so on. 

The obsessive resurrecting of dead stars becomes most problematic, though, when it comes to female stars, most specifically, so-called 'sex symbols'.  In particular, Marilyn Monroe.  I've lost count of the number of ersatz 'Blonde Bombshells' I've seen portrayed on screen, as just about every aspect of her life and death have been probed and examined.  There seems to be an overwhelming desire to somehow reanimate her sexual allure to an extent that borders on necrophilia.  Virtual necrophilia.  It really does make me a trifle uneasy.  Mind you, things can only get worse - with digital technology it will no longer be necessary to find actors who look vaguely like the original, film makers will be able to actually recreate the real thing.  It's already happening: just look at that recreation of Peter Cushing that Star Wars sequel.  Once the technology becomes cheap enough and is accessible by the most unscrupulous end of the sexploitation industry, we'll undoubtedly see those Marilyn Monroe nude scenes - and more- as she finally, posthumously, appears in a hardcore porn movie.  Come on, you just know that it is going to happen.