Just Jen's Reviews

The Bride! (Yes, with the exclamation mark, God help us) sounds punk rock: a murdered young woman resurrected to become the bride/possession of Victor Frankenstein rages against a patriarchal society to claim a name of ones own.

There is an air of Shelley’s world of gothic horror reinvigorated for modern audiences through the debaucherous 1930s. On paper, The Bride! promises something daring, strange, and stylish—a feminist, genre-bending reworking of a familiar myth.

And for a while, it is exactly that.

At the centre of it all is Jessie Buckley, who plays The Bride and she is undeniably compelling. Her bride is bold, brash, and defiantly uncontainable in a performance that echoes the same chaotic energy she brought to Wicked Little Letters (2023). Buckley gives the film a pulse, even when situations and characters around her feel flat and unfocused, including her husband-to-be.

Christian Bale delivers a performance that feels surprisingly out of step as Victor Frankenstein. Known for his precision and depth, here he veers into something overly theatrical to the point of distraction. Whether this is a deliberate directorial choice or a misjudged tonal note, it sits uneasily within the film’s already confused identity.

One of its most puzzling threads involves Mary Shelley herself, who appears as a contained spectral presence, possessing the young woman who then becomes the Bride. Oh yes, and Shelley is played by Jessie Buckley for some reason. It’s an intriguing concept—blurring creator and creation—but there is no logic to her meta-presence, which raises many questions the narrative never answers.

Writer-director Maggie Gyllenhaal plays with ideas of reinvention and rage, and there are flashes of something genuinely interesting in both concept and imagery. From Victor’s obsession with a silver screen star—mirroring his desire to possess grace and poise—to the Bride’s search for purpose and identity, the film gestures toward something meaningful. There’s also a great moment when women take to the streets to express their anger, marking themselves with ink blots and styling themselves with wild frenzy as they embody the Bride.

There’s something admirable in taking a swing this big, and there is a sense that The Bride! is constantly seeking to say something profound. It’s a shame that—among cinema trips, visits to Shelley in limbo and a mafia subplot—it gets lost along the way.

Rating: 2/5

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