RIOTUS

“I went to see the original ‘Bride of Frankenstein’. I don’t know how many of you have seen it or seen it recently, but the Bride isn’t in it. I mean, she’s in it for two minutes, and she doesn’t say one word.” –Maggie Gyllenhaal

If anyone says Mary Shelley is rolling in her grave after the making of THE BRIDE!, Maggie Gyllenhaal already beat them to it. Mary Shelley (Jessie Buckley) is the driving force in ‘possession’ of Gyllenhaal’s revisionist rampage—giving the previously silent but screaming Bride of Frankenstein her voice, her rage, and somebody to shock the world with. 

I didn’t expect to find the wrathful ghost of Mary Shelley haunting this love & guns styled story, but it starts and ends with her and the story she never got to tell. Or perhaps it’s the frequent misrepresentation of her text that keeps her tethered to the living world (we’ll get to that later). This is the tale of a woman named Ida (also Buckley), who bends to the whims of mafia men to survive, but witnesses the death and suffering of other women like her. That pain forms a crack in her psyche; that crack is where the ghost gets in. But it’s an uneasy union between the ghost who has too much to say, co-piloting a woman who needs to hold her tongue or lose it. 

It is also the story of Frankenstein, the Monster (Christian Bale), and his loneliness. Frank travels to Chicago to seek out Dr. Euphronius (Annette Bening), the foremost mad scientist in “reinvigoration.” She’s hesitant, but the ‘science!’ seduces her. Lucky for them, unluckily for Ida, she has a fatal accident, and they capitalize on the situation. Lies, amnesia, and constant pressure from Shelley set things into motion—and by motion, I mean violence. An odd side effect is that Shelley becomes a matchmaker for her monstrous son. The Bride, who can’t remember her name, falls for Frank, who learns to live for the first time through loving her back. But you know those pesky lies are going to make things as difficult as the pair of reanimated lovers rampaging across the country on a crime spree. 

THE BRIDE! is engrossing, visual adrenaline, but it swerves wildly—needing one last story edit to streamline the chaos and bring it into cohesion. The storytelling and references come at you like an electrified hailstorm. There’s so much going on, and so little explained, that you might need a study guide. Especially if you’ve never seen: Bonnie & Clyde (1967), Badlands, Metropolis, or Wild at Heart—all references Gyllenhaal cites. I’ll add influences from True Romance, Natural Born Killers, and Chicago the musical.

However, the nerdier fans among us will see a 1930s yet punk rock pairing with the aura of Amanda Conner and Jimmy Palmiotti’s Harley Quinn, who’s loved and supported by a more evolved Joker in Bale’s Frank. While other fans will point out the parallels to the ‘80s movie, The Legend of Billie Jean, another tale about a blonde riot-grrrl whose rebellion starts a movement. In that way, THE BRIDE! delivers similar but superior Joker and Harley, turning a folie à deux (shared psychosis) into a pas de deux (dance for two). Even in its wildest and most eye-poppingly disjointed moments, The Bride is a truer folk hero—she feels the pain she causes as intensely as the pain inflicted on her.

Jessie Buckley is incandescent as the Bride, taking on a frenetic dissociative identity disorder. Yet you always know who’s in control, whether it’s Shelley or The Bride. But this is the ‘30s, and you suspect The Bride can only burn so brightly before her bulb burns out. Frank is a sweetie with a temper. He loves the big, black and white musicals of the era, but particularly a disabled leading man, played with literal panache by Jake Gyllenhaal. Bale’s version of Frank is a lovely human, with more emphasis on the humanity than most of the other characters. But he makes mistakes as big as he is. Penelope Cruz and Peter Sarsgaard are Myrna Mallow, Lady Detective, and Jake Wiles, the face of the operation. He has secrets, she has skills, and neither the inciting incident nor the femme-forward ending could happen without them. Cruz is so good—but that’s not news, being great is her default setting. 

THE BRIDE! looks good too. Frank’s visual is a throwback to the original movie’s character design. The square head, the staples holding him together, the uneven lengths of his legs, it all feels recognizable and lived in, but presented in a new way. The Bride, however, gets a punk rock makeover. Black ink splattered across her lips, staining her mouth, spattered burnt-orange dress—unbuttoned to reveal her black lace bra, and a metal leg brace screwed into the bones to keep her moving. Their visuals are both well-matched and in contrast, supporting his old-world sensibilities and her burn-it-down desires. 

This movie is wild and, as I mentioned above, might confuse as much as it excites. I had a hard time reconciling Shelley’s ghost being tied to a sci-fi world she created. I couldn’t understand how the very real Shelley could co-exist with Frankenstein. After a couple of days thinking about it, I have a theory: 

It’s possible that what we view as a possession isn’t a traditional one. Instead, imagine it as a lingering remnant of Mary Shelley’s intentions that isn’t affecting the real world, but rewriting the Frankenstein universe. Revisiting her own stories to make her thoughts on the monstrous-feminine clear. 

If so, her intent and disembodied rage at how her original book had been misinterpreted—even in the ‘30s is what is possessing The Bride. When you consider that possession is a Gothic horror motif, often springing from mental duress, my theory falls right in line with the dialogue. Mary Shelley says right up front that she sees a crack in Ida, and that’s where she’s going to slip in. They both have regrets, and the name Ida could easily be double for “I would have” as in “Ida done it differently if I had another chance.” That’s true of The Bride’s life ending abruptly before she has a chance to fight her personal villains.

In the end, THE BRIDE! is a wild, unruly rave for femme-fueled power, love where none lived before, and the fight to be both monstrous and magnificent. It’s chaotic, but I can (mostly) rock with that.