Spoiler Free Bullet Points:
Final Thoughts: Recommended - A Queer Must-See
Highlights:
Stewart and O'Brien pack a punch in the chemistry department delivering performances that stand up to the dynamic approach to this film
Costumes stun and display the power clothes have in story telling and queer expression
Director Rose Glass utilizes unique visuals and effects while displaying a masterful understanding of narrative fiction
Content Warnings: Drug use, physical violence, domestic abuse, gore effects, murder, death, parental abandonment, explicit sexual content, emotional abuse, blood, sexual exploitation, parental death and near death experiences.
Age Recommendation: 18+ (Film is Rated R - USA)
Heavily explicit sexual content
Shown drug use
Heavily visual gore and death
Spoilers Ahead
Every Valentine's Day, women loving women everywhere are plagued with the pressure of choosing the perfect gift for their partners. Luckily now there's a clear and concise answer of how to show your girlfriend, wife or lover that they are the one for you: three separate crime scenes that would definitely tie her to murder if not for the investigative quality of the 1980s. Well, it also helps if she is the daughter of a lifelong criminal. That was one of the many take aways of Love Lies Bleeding that have stuck with me since viewing the film. This film is about a lot of things, but it boils down to being a tumultuous tale of power - guns, weights, information and grit, the forces that fuel the plot and each character's dramatic need. Between immersive music, intense visuals, and a story that places love between drugs and death, A24 puts out yet another love letter to cinema.
Queerness, Power and Costumes
This film takes on the heavy load that is the history of queer women seeking empowerment and expression through appearance, especially in gender non conforming spaces. Studs, butches, chap stick lesbians and the classic tom boy are all areas of expression that women loving women take on with pride and danger. These physical identifiers through clothing can be used as not only expression but queer-signaling, which provokes the patriarchal society that takes female empowerment as offensive, challenging or emasculating. Olga Mill captures the different approaches to power differently in all of the characters, but specifically the three queer characters that are within the film. Lou (played by Kristen Stewart) is of smaller stature and on a journey of building her physical strength. Physicality holds a position of focus in her life due to the fact that her brother in law JJ (Dave Franco) physically abuses her sister, Beth (Jena Malone). Lou feels powerless as she is unable to physically spar with him. In a series of baggy pants and boxy shirts with cut off sleeves, Lou builds a masculinizing wardrobe that contributes to the display of her inability to physically match with JJ. Finding her clothing empowering, Lou differs from Jackie (Katy O'Brien).
Jackie is physically phenomenal. A body builder that says at one point that she prefers to know her own strength. She shows an immediate display of power when she decks a fellow gym goer without accounting for his size or gender. Jackie is able to build her natural physique, which she later chooses to dangerously enhance with artificial support. Her confidence in her physicality and her history as a body builder is shown in the costume choices made for her. Sticking to traditionally feminine clothing colors, Jackie wears revealing clothing at nearly all times: her arms, legs and mid-drift usually in view. She's comfortable in her body and power that she does not feel intimidated by it showing.
Costumes continue to display different types of power in various ways for the different types of power the characters represent. JJ is in clothes that read as respectable for the time. He comes across as a regular and even desirable man. Featured in t-shirts and bright, wide collar button downs, he is always dressed appropriately for where he is. His power is simply being a man, and being taken at face value no matter how depraved or abusive he is. Beth appears in good housewife apparel. She continues to appear as a traditional woman, almost as if she is hoping that the rules of chivalry will eventually reach out and protect her. She embraces a woman's place, allowing her recognizable femininity to be a tool for how she is received and moves through the world. There's so much to be said about the deigns and layers to how costumes told a huge part of this story, but of course, it's always, the work will speak for itself best when it's consumed.
You're Watching a Movie, and the Movie Knows It
Immersion of the audience is the goal of every film, and often times that means making the film echo reality as much as possible, even if it has a highly improbable premise. As filmmakers, there's a euphoric feeling to see your audience, just for a moment, forget they're in a theater, their eyes glued to your tale that unfolds before them. Love Lies Bleeding does a phenomenal job of immersing the audience in the world of Lou and Jackie, but there is direct use of unnatural effects and injected scenery that reminds you that you are watching a film in the best way possible.
One of the most prominent visual features is when Jackie's body is enlarged in a Hulk-Like expansion. Unlike Marvel's transforming hero, Jackie's transformation is internal and is an echo of the character's perception and feeling in that moment. It is riddled with visual metaphor and it dances on the line of reality within the film. Her super-sizing interacts with the plot multiple times, particularly the end sequence where Lu and Jackie are giants, running through clouds against a pink sky - a fun visual expression of their freedom that is found at the end of the film. Rather than approach with pure realism, the film creates a sense of canonical fantasy that allows for the viewer to partake in the vivid imagination of not only director Rose Glass, but the huge emotions of the characters.
Glass created some additional choices of sequence interjection that not only contrasted the flow of the surrounding scenes, but introduced a non-linear element. One that worked to reveal information to the audience about Lou, that followed show don't tell with overreaching clarity and inventive storytelling. It was not a major portion of the film's screen time, but it did create a sense of back story that flowed with the audience's learning about Lou and the dynamic of her father. By creating these moment of unveiling, Glass and fellow writer Weronika Tofilska showed their meticulous story telling skills and patience.
Another department that flexed their storytelling abilities is the sound department. Right from the opening sequence, there is a strong use of non-diegetic music and natural sounds to create immediate narrative control over the audience. It's used to drag the audience into the world of this film rather immediately. Thematically there was a strong emphasis of music being impacted by character emotion. It was an effective mix of spoon-fed narration and interpretive material as the film moved. Everything being slightly bigger, louder or dramatic with heavily swung emotions that mimicked the emotional status of the characters. The sound editing for this film was genuinely enjoyable and contributed to the overall experience in a positive way. The graphic's sound support team did phenomenally and this film would genuinely not be the same without them.
Overall Impressions
If I'm honest, this was a film that displayed so much narrative dominance, artistic expression and understanding of story telling that it feels like a love letter to the indie circuit. It's not a film for the masses per say and the film knows that. Unwavering uniqueness and an all-consuming approach, this film is on my in-theaters recommendation list. It's a film tat needs the surround sound and silver screen to be truly experienced. Stewart and O'Brien are electric in their performances, continuing to stun in even the most outlandish of circumstances. In the end Love Lies Bleeding is a story of power and gay toxicity in the best way possible. If you're looking for a fun and obsessive film that is fueled by titillating performances, run to see this film.
Love Lies Bleeding is currently available in theaters.
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