In 1930s Chicago, Frankenstein’s Monster (Christian Bale) and a mad scientist (Annette Bening) resurrect a recently deceased woman (Jessie Buckley), who has ties to the Mob — and Mary Shelley.
Maggie Gyllenhaal has had an incredible career with complicated women. From her own on-screen portrayals in Secretary, The Deuce and The Kindergarten Teacher to her 2021 directorial debut The Lost Daughter, she fills the world with knotty, tempestuous women who refuse to be flattened by societal norms. So, news that she would turn her talents to the tale of the Bride Of Frankenstein — the character created by Mary Shelley as a female companion to the Monster, played iconically by Elsa Lanchester in 1935 — seemed a match made in heaven. Unfortunately, The Bride! arrives not as feminist triumph but as a true hot mess.
The film follows Shelley herself (Jessie Buckley) speaking from somewhere — Purgatory, maybe? — as she appears to influence, and occasionally possess, a woman named Ida (also Buckley), a Depression-era sex worker who dies in an impressively gnarly stair-fall. She is buried in a pauper’s grave, in the dress she expired in, but is resurrected thanks to Frankenstein’s Monster (Christian Bale), known here as Frank, who convinces Dr Euphronius (Annette Bening) to create him a bride (Buckley again). After a violent encounter with one of the many, many men that attempt to sexually assault the titular Bride, the reanimated pair become Bonnie & Clyde style criminals and go on a road trip in order to evade law enforcement (Peter Sarsgaard, Penélope Cruz) and continue their unconvincing love story.
For every single filmmaking choice possible, Gyllenhaal makes ten.
For every single filmmaking choice possible, Gyllenhaal makes ten. The film is a love letter to cinema, a road movie, a tribute to female detective work, a revenge story, a tale about police corruption and kind of a musical. But none of these cohere as a whole, and the only thing that sticks in the mind is that Gyllenhaal couldn’t pleasingly frame a musical number if her life depended on it.
What the film does have going for it is committed performances from its talented cast, and make-up and costume design that is a true feast for the eyes. But ultimately what the film most exudes is incompetence.(Rumours of reshoots abound.) Despite flashes of glory, the editing is chaotic. Character appearances and costumes appear out of sequence.
While we all want to live in a world where artists like Gyllenhaal are given sackfuls of cash to make their passion projects, The Bride! is a crushing disappointment that almost obscures the brilliance and sensitivity she displayed in The Lost Daughter. In the immortal words of Tyra Banks: we were all rooting for you.
Fans of Maggie Gyllenhaal will be disappointed; fans of Mary Shelley will be disappointed; fans of unhinged cinema will be morbidly intrigued.
