A stitched together menagerie of monstrously ambitious ideas, The Bride is brimming with life and macabre romance, even if its constant electric shocks won’t reverberate with everyone. Written and directed by Maggie Gyllenhaal, The Bride is a vision fully realized, a beautiful yet hideous creature that is hard to describe, even when it has been seen.
Jessie Buckley absolutely commands the screen as the title character, delivering another searing performance in the wake of her Oscar worthy turn in Hamnet. Buckley may be the best actress working today and she puts her talents on full display here, snarling and chewing her way through scene after scene. The film’s opening moments showcases Buckley operating at the most primeval of levels, the film seething in sync with her every breath.
Gyllenhaal directs the fuck out The Bride, a symbiotic pairing with Buckley. These two women, one in front of the camera, the other behind, go all in to give us something pulsingly fresh and vibrant. Colorful, angry, violent, sexy, and relentlessly energetic, The Bride can best be described as an uncontained piece of art.
That doesn’t mean I loved it, however.
The Bride is a sight to behold, a piece of entertainment to be experienced, but it’s strange, it’s wild, and somewhat chaotic, even if it’s exactly the movie Gyllenhaal set out to make (and I’m pretty sure it’s exactly that). It never lets up to the degree it’s exhausting, and I felt a sigh of relief when things finally came to a head after several close calls on this Bonnie & Clyde-esque romp. “Tedious” isn’t the right word, but there is something unrelenting about the whole affair that is almost too much to handle.
Pieces of the monster don’t entirely fit, either. While some may find the occasional musical or dance numbers ill-fitting, those amazingly worked for me. But the detectives hunting Frankenstein’s Monster and the Bride seem to be from another movie, their story and its delivery oddly straightlaced and bland compared to everything else. Penelope Cruz’s character is especially out of place, her arc seemingly more important to Gyllenhaal than what we see on screen.
As for Christian Bale, I’m not exactly sure what to say. Bale is a terrific actor and he should be given kudos for his off-kilter and yet not-off-kilter performance as the Monster. It’s a strange performance, but then again it’s meant to be, a strange performance in a strange movie. What I do know is that Buckley runs circles around him, perhaps by design. The balance seems off.
Then again, Gyllenhaal seems to enjoy keeping her audience off balance.
The Bride didn’t fully work for me, but it’s hard to deny its raw, seductive energy. Gyllenhaal gave it her all and the end product represents that, a dangerously mesmerizing and electrifying portrayal of unconventional love and attraction.
Review by Erik Samdahl. Erik is a marketing and technology executive by day, avid movie lover by night. He is a member of the Seattle Film Critics Society.