There’s nobody who has had a more exciting narrative arc over the past ten years than Kristen Stewart. From her breakout role in Twilight, it was obvious that she was going to be a star. When Stewart came out as gay on SNL in 2017, many of us wondered exactly what that would mean for her acting career. With her newest film, Love Lies Bleeding, Stewart proved that it’s going to mean great things both for her acting career and lesbians everywhere.
It almost seems shocking that this film would make it to theaters, and it’s a delightful sign that A24 was willing to put the money behind it to make this the big hit it deserves to be. In Love Lies Bleeding, Stewart plays Lou, a gym manager with a difficult past that falls in love with Jackie (Katy O’Brian), a recently-nomadic bodybuilder set on winning a competition in a few months time.
O’Brian and Stewart are both electric in their respective roles. From the very first scene they share, the chemistry is palpable, and that does a lot of the heavy lifting for the plausibility of this plot. As time goes on and Jackie begins to spiral, Lou must make difficult decisions about whether to protect herself or her girlfriend. What started out as a love story quickly evolves into horror as layers begin to peel back and we devolve into surrealism and alternate reality.
It’s incredibly difficult to write about this movie without spoiling it entirely, so forgive me for my vague commentary. While the first half of the movie is focused on developing Lou and Jackie’s relationship with each other and those around them, the introduction of performance enhancing steroids into Jackie’s routine leads to something darker. The second half is an action-packed adventure that effectively utilizes body horror and the relationships of the first half to pack a punch in every scene.
In the vein of so many lesbian blockbusters over the past year, this is a film for the little weirdos. The surrealism is campy but underpinned by such dark undertones that I was on the edge of my seat the entire time. Somehow, as it becomes more fantastical, it becomes more real as well. Rose Glass (the director) did an incredible job of balancing the two and creating a work that feels both too big for reality and confined by it.
This is almost certainly going to be one of my top films of the year, and I highly recommend it to anyone looking for a dark and twisted thriller.
