Love Lies Bleeding
Rose Glass lulls us into a fairly straightforward film noir narrative as “Love Lies Bleeding” begins. The archetypes of the genre are developed, but in a way that will surprise us as the film progresses. Even if the genders are bent from the days of “Detour,” “Body Heat” or “In a Lonely Place,” the characters will feel familiar. The ways Glass bends the story, and characters, through her setting and thematic ideas is where “Love Lies Bleeding” gets its power. Even when it gets really wacky in the third act, we get why it’s going there.
Lou (Kristen Stewart) works at a gym in a small Arizona town; early on, we see her unclogging a toilet, and a local woman, Daisy (Anna Baryshnikov), comes to her, wanting to know if she wants to get together later. Meanwhile, on the other side of town, Jackie (Katy O’Brian) is new in town, and with JJ (Dave Franco) in his car. He might have a job for her, but she’ll be sleeping underneath the overpass. The next day, she goes to the gym Lou works at; she is a bodybuilder, hoping to get into the Finals in Las Vegas. There’s an immediate connection between Lou and Jackie, and while they clearly love one another, a fateful choice will make their lives more challenging moving forward.
Already, you can see some of the pieces fall into place for the noir Glass has in store for us, but we also have the characters of Beth, played by Jena Malone, and Lou Sr., played by Ed Harris. Beth and Lou are sisters, and Lou Sr.’s daughters. Beth is also married to JJ, who works for Lou Sr. at a gun range. The criminal aspect of the story comes from Lou Sr.’s life, and we get the impression that Lou is aware of his past- she gets a visit from an FBI agent at the gym- we won’t know the full extent until someone ends up dead. Like the Wachowski’s “Bound,” Glass and Weronika Tofilska’s screenplay isn’t just using the attraction of two same-sex characters to titillate the audience into following a familiar crime film; Lou and Jackie being who they are- at the time they are (which is the late ’80s)- is important to their own sense of alienation from society as a whole, and their families specifically. They find they need one another the more the film goes on, and their connection- even when it feels like there is no going back to one another.
When the film goes off the rails into dark humor and body horror, the ingenious part of “Love Lies Bleeding” is that it is a natural extension of the story. Jackie essentially becomes a character out of a Cronenberg film, and O’Brian is flat-out terrific at embodying the drive, the sexuality, the vulnerability and the violence within this character; it is an early front-runner for my favorite performance of the year. Her and Stewart has heated chemistry, and this is another tremendous performance by Stewart as she is a woman who knows a lot, but sometimes struggles in getting things worked through. The third act of the film is a truly out of control and surreal- there’s going to be laughing taking place- but it works for the film, as does the film’s soundtrack and sound design (which is emphasized by the score by Clint Mansell). “Love Lies Bleeding” has some familiarity, but its approach is anything but familiar, and that will always be welcome.
