Biceps bulge, romance blooms, and bullets fly in a steroid-fueled,queer thriller with killercoiffures.Love Lies Bleedinggets your adrenaline pumping as a pulpy narrative twists and turns to a rocking ’80s soundtrack.Saint Mauddirector Rose Glass continues to push the envelope in an audacious second feature. She boldly blends salacious material with fever-dream visuals and lurid performances to create a cinematic razor’s edge. Every character walks a dangerous line between lust and rage as loyalties are tested to a savage outcome.
Jackie (Katy O’Brian) arrives in a dusty New Mexico town circa 1989. She escapes her troubled past with dreams of winning a bodybuilding competition in Las Vegas. Jackie has a memorable encounter with JJ, Dave Franco, sporting a sweet mullet before hitting the local gym the next day. She makes her presence felt immediately. Lou (Kristen Stewart), the manager, is instantly smitten by Jackie’s toughness and rugged sex appeal. They’re drawn to each other like magnets.
Lou has a side hustle of supplying steroids to her clients. Jackie’s nervous about trying performance-enhancing drugs. She wants to bulk up naturally but already has complete faith in Lou. The injection surges through her body. Jackie’s veins bulge as she grabs the weights with gusto. Lou watches, intoxicatedby her new lover. The fire between them smoldering as passions erupt even further.
Love Lies Bleeding and Passionate Lovers
Love Lies Bleeding
Lou’s upset to learn that Jackie works as a waitress at the gun range. She begs her to stay away from the owner. Lou Sr. (Ed Harris) is a dangerous man not to be trifled with. He’s much more than an eccentric bug collector. Lou has done her best to stay away from him. But their paths inevitably cross over a shared concern. Beth (Jena Malone) invites Lou and Jackie to a Chinese dinner. Lou’s furious to see Beth has another black eye. She warns JJ that’s the last time he touches her sister.
Love Lies Bleedinghas fantasy elements that accentuate the plot’s extreme changes. Jackie looks like Bruce Banner hulking out after every steroid shot. Her muscles inflate to the point of grotesquely tearing through her skin. Jackie becomes hyper-aggressive and sexualized. O’Brian must have filmed the first act’s scenes and taken a break to gain muscle mass. Jackie transforms from shapely fit to a shredded behemoth in minutes of screen time.Slick training montageschart her growth as Lou fawns in admiration at her titillating progress.
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Glass uses different color palettes and camera placement to indicate mood. Violence bathes the screen blood-red with a skewed, angular perspective. The goal is to illustrate how anger warps common sense reactions. Softer hues accompany the torrid sex scenes. Jackie and Lou copulate like rabbits in a burrow, but there’s a deeper meaning to the flesh escapades. Their intense love affair isn’t purely physical. Both women were lost and unsure of themselves. Random connections were just a salve for their wounded souls. They complete each other in a way that threatens Lou’s father’s hold over her.
A Menacing Ed Harris
Stewart and O’Brian burn the screenwith fiery chemistry. They have an obvious physical attraction that quickly leads to hopeful fulfillment. Lou is trapped in a hell created by her domineering father. JJ, like everyone in town, works for him. She cannot leave her sister behind. Jackie has spent her entire life running away. The bodybuilding competition is a goal within reach. Meeting Lou is pure kismet. She finds a partner who completes her happiness. But rash decisions have disastrous consequences for the impetuous. Jackie and Lou discover how far each will go for love. This is the crux of the film.
Harris nearly steals the show with humor and menace. His villainy doesn’t broadcast its intentions. Lou Sr. is a puppet master who expects obedience and order. His daughters hate and fear him but cannot break free of an iron grip. Their father’s word is the law. Harris, long hair flowing beside his bald spot, exudes a creepy confidence that dominates the film. He’s an old hand whose nerves aren’t easily rattled. Lou knows what he’s capable of. Jackie’s hard-charging personality and steroid bravado meet a formidable match.
Love Lies Bleedinghas aclever sound designintegral to the film’s effectiveness.Pop Will Eat Itselffrontman Clint Mansell, known for scoring Darren Aronofsky’sThe FountainandBlack Swan, employs jarring sounds with hard rock and synth-pop to help frame Glass' vision. The film swings wildly between eroticism and violence. Each heightened moment has an audible note of something extraordinary afoot. Playful interactions between Jackie and Lou sound endearing. The exact opposite is heard when teeth are shattered from skulls. It’s nothing familiar but encompasses exactly what transpires. Mansell is quite brilliant here. The film wouldn’t feel the same without his contribution.
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Jackie’s “roid rage” hallucinations, risqué sex scenes, and the film’s graphic brutality can be viewed as frivolous excess. Subtract that from the equation, and perhaps the formula doesn’t work as well. It depends entirely on willing suspension of disbelief. Glassisn’t aiming for realism.Love Lies Bleedingworks with a shock-and-awe approach.
Love Lies Bleedingis a production of Film4, Escape Plan, and Lobo Films. It will have a limited theatrical release on Mar. 8, followed by national distribution on Mar. 15 from A24. Watch the trailer below.
