Buenos Aires: The auction of one of only two known copies of a pornographic film purportedly featuring a young Marilyn Monroe fizzled in Buenos Aires because the bids did not meet or exceed the $500,000 set as the initial price.
The largest offer came from a private collector in Denver, who bid $280,000, but the amount did not satisfy the owner of the film, the auction promoter, Spaniard Mikel Barsa, told EFE.
"It's part of the game; now a negotiation will come in which the buyer will want to pay the lowest price and the seller will seek to get the highest" for the short movie, which allegedly was filmed in 1946 or 1947, he said.
The black-and-white film, about six minutes long, had been in the hands of a Spanish collector who recently died.
Upon going through his noteworthy film collection, the man's heirs discovered the unique tape and - after several months - made contact with Barsa, who already had sold the only other copy of the film that has surfaced to date.
When that first copy came to light in 1997, it sparked a huge controversy about its authenticity, with many people doubting that the actress in it was really Norma Jeane Baker (1926-62), who later came to be known as Marilyn Monroe.
Barsa said that although there are still people who doubt its authenticity, it has been proven - using FBI documents that were created when that agency investigated the film around the time it was produced - that the Hollywood icon is really the person who appears in it.
Upon announcing the auction last month, Barsa also said that the jewellery the actress wears in the film was also worn by her in other films and photographs made about the same time.
A firm representing Monroe's estate had threatened to sue Barsa if he sold the film, insisting that the girl seen in the piece was not Marilyn.
The first copy of the film was shown in 1997 on several occasions and marketed by several magazines, one of them the Spanish publication Interviu, before it was sold to a private collector in 2001 for $1.2 million.
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