IR Film Review: THE BRIDE! [Warner Bros.]
The functionality of the monster movie at this point is reinvention and perspective. With "The Bride", writer/director Maggie Gyllenhaal takes a surefire swing that is uneven and not for everyone but it is strong in its viewpoint and its artistic vision. Setting the tale and giving its own tendencies starting off in 1930s Chicago there is definitely a blend of "Bonnie & Clyde" and "True Romance". Christian Bale is good as always playing more brooding and quiet as Frank (until he bursts) but opposite him Jessie Buckley as Ida/The Bride really shines like the sun. While the introduction and explanation is a little metaphorical (and the black and white scenes seem a little too poised in their Mary-isms), Buckley's breakneck, beautiful and heartbreaking play as The Bride solidifies her as a force to be reckoned with. No offense to "Hamnet" which is its own thing but this is more powerful and culture defining, depending if people go to see it. The film is uneven to be sure.
The side story of Peter Sarsgaard (as Detective Jake) and Penelope Cruz (as would-be detective Myrna Loy) is good but they are in a completely different gumshoe film almost. The ode of Jake Gyllenhaal (as film star Ronnie Reed) is a beautiful parallel for Frank (and definitely changes it up for Bale as Frank). Gyllenhaal even sang most of the standards (with Vince Giordino and The Blackhawks backing him up). Frank in this iteration is initially cautious against his base nature and what he has gone through. But what is fantastic is how Ida brings him alive (and yet he is lying to her too -- he thinks to protect her). Director Gyllenhaal uses this as a motif which reflects after the big set piece in a ballroom (which happens by odd circumstance anyway). Ida becomes the face of a movement (encouraging brain attack) while starring in her own violent but soapboxing musical). This is of course a thinly veil reference to another movement...and Gyllenhaal pushes the idea in an important way, especially during a traffic stop when Frank finally helps Isa but he (like almost earlier in the movie at a club) when he didn't take action when he should of, waits way longer than he should. Even in the final moments, Frank tries to come clean but Ida is moved by many different things, all consumed in rage...and yet there is some primal joy in how she works. Even at the beginning when Mary makes herself known, it is like one of the girls in "Scarface" calling out the gangsters.
Again it is primal and Buckley plays it just right because this character needs to be all over the place. At one point when they are on a train trying to escape from one place to another, Buckley goes from manic to self deluding to empathetic to vapid all within the space of a minute. It is only when the film enters its final act does it really answer some of its questions while posing others. Frank wants to solve his loneliness but it is not that simple. He is able to see his existence in Ida and his in hers but not without pain, lust and a little bit of 20/20. Annette Bening plays the mad scientist that helps crack the code for Frank and figures both into the inset and outset. The film is a tragic love story but one filled with a road journey that just speaks to living life in the moment and to the fullest (even if one doesn't know where it will lead). Frank looks up to the moving pictures of Ronnie Reed (he loves the movies just like Clarence in "True Romance") because he sees it as the idea of if not a perfect then a possible life. The key is that people tend to let you down. Ida never lets Frank down. She changes what he thinks he wants and she is able to be herself despite anything which makes the final shot all the more memorable. Director Gyllenhaal makes a movie both inventive and uneven, lyrical and yet primal, unbalanced and yet powerful, which is what art is supposed to be. There is a certain parallel of Joker somewhere between the first one and Jolie A' Deux where it gets some beautiful things right and does that more often than not. But it is Buckley that rivets one to the screen specifically in this role more than anything else. B+
By Tim Wassberg
