- Release Date: 05/04/2024
- Cast: Kristen Stewart, Katy O’Brian, Dave Franco, Ed Harris, Anna Baryshnikov
- Director: Rose Glass
In Love Lies Bleeding, Kristen Stewart plays Lou, a lesbian gym owner who falls in love with a bisexual female bodybuilder, Jackie (Katy O’Brian), who was passing through her town on her way to a bodybuilding competition in Las Vegas. The two immediately strike a chord and light a fuse in each other that leads to them engaging in some steamy, sweaty sex. They quickly fall in love and develop a sense of dependence on each other.
I absolutely loved the fact that Director Rose Glass never once tried to sanitize the overwhelming sexual attraction that Lou and Jackie shared and the ensuing rigorous and pulsating encounter that resulted from that attraction.
Glass doesn’t try to explain their actions or add any layer of depth to it sighting it as something that resulted out of a feeling of love for each other that is then reinforced later.
Lou is sexually frustrated and raring to go as is initially established. Jackie is jacked beyond control and the doses of steroids that Lou provides her with in their first meeting work only as a catalyst for the way she pounces on Lou. What follows is the two not only going at each other physically but also, in the process, developing all the emotions and tropes that we associate with a couple in love.
Emotions like jealousy, contradictions, suspicion, and doing things for one another that have not been asked quickly pour into their brief but strong relationship. While Lou makes Jackie her day’s work, Jackie has just one more thing that she desires more than being with Lou: winning the bodybuilding competition in Vegas.
Things take a bizarre turn when Jackie and Lou realize that they are connected in more ways than one. Jackie is working at Lou’s father’s gun range. She had sex with Lou’s abusive brother-in-law, JJ (Dave Franco), in the hope of getting the job, and is now a point of conflict between Lou and JJ. JJ taunts Lou sighting the sexual episode between him and Jackie not knowing what it would lead to later. All hell breaks loose when JJ, in his endeavour of repeatedly abusing Lou’s sister, beats her so badly that she ends up in a hospital. Jackie sets out to avenge her and crushes JJ’s face in a scene that feels straight out of a monster film. Lou now has to somehow save Jackie from the police and dispose of the corpse. While she is at it, she tries to do something that will also rid her of the one person that she hates as much as she hated JJ: her father, Lou Sr. (Ed Harris).
It is eventually revealed that Lou was involved in her father’s illegal gun-running business until her mother’s disappearance. As the FBI closes in on Lou Sr. and investigates JJ’s murder, both Lou and Jackie lose their grasp on reality, leading to an explosive climax that defies all expectations.
Evocative Aesthetics and Dynamic Relationship Development:
The look and feel of the film are not only consistent with the late ’80s to early ’90s but also capture the griminess and the blood and sweat involved in the tale with such impact and power that it is the first thing you notice about the film. The opening credits and the fonts used to spell out the name of the film made one of my two aesthetically critical friends clap and cheer. This was unexpected as the film had barely begun.
In the next few minutes, we see the camera gradually move from gazing at the stars to the interiors of a gym that will remind you of the bodybuilding documentaries like Arnold Schwarzenegger’s “Pumping Iron”. Beefy, hairy, sweating men pushing their bodies to achieve that elusive perfect shape, with signs like “Pain Is Weakness Leaving the Body” displayed on the walls for inspiration.
The first time we see Lou, she is practically in a world of shit, unblocking a toilet with her hands. The first time we see Jackie, she is being taken advantage of at the back of a car by a man who is evidently despicable, with one of the worst mullets one can imagine. The two characters meet soon enough and without a word said, I could sense the chemistry between them primarily by the way they looked at each other.
The way Lou behaves around Jackie and how uncontrollably Jackie grins when she is in Lou’s presence tells you everything you need to know.
Perspectives And Perplexities Fueling Drama and Intrigue:
The film then quickly shifts gears as the events start escalating, leading to one breakneck situation after another. Jackie murders JJ, and Lou tries to cover up for her. Jackie pushes her steroid usage to the boundaries of substance abuse, clouding her mind and leading her to do things she continually regrets.
Lou realizes that someone knows about the murder of JJ and needs to be taken care of. Lou Sr. tries to save his daughter by framing Jackie, while Lou wants to frame Lou Sr. for the murders and save Jackie. The FBI wants to nail Lou Sr. for his gun running.
All these different elements come together in what proves to be one combustible powder keg of a situation, resulting in a climax that I couldn’t have foreseen. It borders on being bizarre and is equally unbelievable.
It is never explained from whose perspective we are watching the events unfold. Is it Lou under the influence of drugs? Is it just a symbolic representation of the power that the women hold over Lou Sr. once they have made peace with themselves?
Is it both of them hallucinating, with the director using the camera to practically show us what might be going on in their minds? There are endless possibilities, and your opinion of the finale will result from which of these possibilities you choose to summarize what you have just witnessed.
Impactful Intimate Dynamics and Storytelling Style:
Kristen Stewart and Katy O’Brian are scintillating in the film. It isn’t easy to sell a lesbian romance in a film and make it feel natural, impactful and hot. There wasn’t any other way for this film to be what it was, especially when it came to the romance and chemistry between the two.
There might be some who question the validity of the development of their relationship at such a pace and how they could develop such strong feelings for one another. I found it to be perfectly natural and effectively done. For me, the pace and the unbridled nature of the romance complemented the bizarre and random things that the two end up doing in the film.
If you look closely, whatever Lou does is to protect Jackie first and herself later. Jackie loses her mind primarily on occasions when she feels undermined, betrayed, or ignored by Lou. The only other time she explodes is when she murders JJ.
This too happens as an amalgamation of reasons ranging between her own hatred for him for taking advantage of her, Lou expressing her desire to mortally wound the man, and the condition in which Jackie sees Lou’s sister after she is brutally abused by JJ.
Thus, it wouldn’t be wrong to say that the whirlwind physical and romantic relationship that Jackie and Lou share is at the root of everything that happens in this film. It is the emotions and the necessity to do something for the other that makes them do things that they would not have otherwise.
Hence, the emphasis on the performances of the two actors is increased twofold. They not only have to sell their sexuality and sexual dependence on one another but also every other aspect of the relationship that complements the various transitions of the storytelling as it moves from one portion to another.
The story at the heart of the film is nothing special. It is something that we have seen many times before. What makes the film special is its execution, the lens through which we are led to see the characters and the situations, the bravura performances from everyone in the ensemble, and the outrageous ending of the film that will either leave you frustrated or excited at having seen something extremely odd and unique.
Eliciting Diverse Responses from Diverse Audiences:
I was watching this film with two people who couldn’t have been more dissimilar from one another. One of them hated the finale after enjoying almost everything about it up to the third act. He was frustrated with the number of untied plot points and characters that were left by the end of the film. He felt the climax to be bizarre and created in a certain way just for the sake of extracting shock and not earning the insanity that it sets out to portray.
He also found the overall story extremely hollow, and the performances from the ensemble cast the only saving grace for the rest of the film. He felt that the film was dated and might have worked at least 10 years ago but not anymore.
The other person liked everything about it except for a portion of the climax. He found it refreshing and out of the box. He found the romance genuine and was consistently hooked by the proceedings, but the bewildering climax was something that he couldn’t completely comply with.
He felt that a little more explanation would have probably made the experience better. As for me, I loved everything about the film. This was, in all possibilities, my favourite A24 production right after “X” and “Pearl”.
Final Words:
This aspect of the film, where three different people walked out with three completely different experiences, made the film even more interesting for me. We live in a time when entertainment is developed like products and has been watered down, made to comply with norms, standards, politics, and numerous other aspects that have not only drained films of their inherent nature to shock, awe, inspire, disappoint, and confuse but have made everything extremely predictable and bland.
To have a film like this in such a time, that is so unbridled and overtly unabashed, having the power to influence and make people react to the same themes and choices in different ways, is nothing short of greatness and a reminder of what cinema used to be. For this reason alone, this film is worth the price of admission. “Love Lies Bleeding” is playing at PVR City Centre. I urge my readers to definitely give it a watch before it surrenders its screen to the upcoming Hindi blockbusters.
Rating: 3.5/5 (3.5 out of 5 Stars)