Stitch Up My Emptiness, ‘Cause You’re The Death Of Me
Directed by Maggie Gyllenhaal
Starring Jessie Buckley, Christian Bale, Annette Bening
Released March 6th, 2026
Rated R
As time passes and The Bride! secures its place as a beloved cult classic for misfits who repeatedly watch The Rocky Horror Picture Show and Lisa Frankenstein, it will be a kick to hear people say things like “What do you mean it flopped when it came out?” The Bride! is an earnest and fun film with wonderful performances, and even a song and dance number. Though the movie’s focus is on women taking their agency back through the unbridled power of righteous female anger, it’s also a goofy monster movie that does its own version of Putting on the Ritz from Mel Brooks’ Young Frankenstein and plays Bobby “Boris” Pickett’s The Monster Mash over the end credits.
In 1930s Chicago, Frankenstein’s monster (Christian Bale) approaches mad scientist Dr. Euphronius (Annette Bening) and tells her that he is lonely and desires a companion. It doesn’t take much convincing before the good doctor and Frank are digging up the grave of a woman (Jessie Buckley) who was recently murdered by mobsters. Euphronius revives the woman, who has no memory of who she was when she was among the living. Frank, desperate for a mate, makes up a whole backstory for her, calls her “Penelope,” and tells her that in life they were madly in love. At first she goes along with this, but begins to question everything once her memories come flashing back. Further complicating matters is the fact that somehow she can hear the disembodied voice of Mary Shelley (also Jessie Buckley), the literary icon who wrote Frankenstein back in 1818.
Frank and Penelope go dancing, clubbing, and to the movies. He is over the moon to have someone to share his (after) life with, and she’s finding death to be quite liberating. Whenever Frank has a panic attack, he goes to see a movie to calm down. His favorite film star is song-and-dance man Ronnie Reed (Jake Gyllenhaal). Things do not go well when Frank and the bride have a chance encounter with Mr. Reed. Soon guns are involved, and people wind up dead. This brings newspaper headlines, public uproar, and Detective Jake Wiles (Peter Sarsgaard) and his partner Myrna Malloy (Penélope Cruz) into the fray. Wiles and Malloy are hot on the trail of the monsters, whose crime spree has inspired women to paint their faces like the bride and stand up to their oppressors.
It’s neat to see a movie that has influences from such a disparate spate of sources. You’ve got nods to everything from Arthur Penn’s Bonnie and Clyde (which made me smile since Annette Bening is married to Warren Beatty) to many classic film references in the form of character names. It’s revealed that the bride’s real name is Ida, and a gangster in the film is named Lupino. You’ve got a character named Myrna. Even Dr. Euphronius’ name recalls the mad Dr. Pretorius from James Whale’s Bride of Frankenstein. In that film, the bride (Elsa Lanchester, who also portrayed Mary Shelley) had barely any screentime, so it’s great to see this character really come alive (albeit in a very different fashion) in this movie.
Christian Bale plays Frank as a sad sack punk trying to make the most of his peculiar situation. It’s an endearing performance and fits nicely with other depictions of Frankenstein’s monster that we’ve seen on screen, though this one may be a little more interested in sex than his predecessors. I’ve yet to see Jessie Buckley give a bad performance, and in this film she gives us three memorable performances: as the doomed Ida, the reanimated Bride, and the angry spirit of Mary Shelley. I’ll be honest and say the inclusion of a foul-mouthed, vengeful Mary Shelley was the element of the film that was the hardest for me to wrap my head around. A colleague of mine said that was her favorite part, so perhaps it will hit different on a rewatch. It would not be accurate to say that Buckley’s performance is over the top. She finds the top, destroys the top, and dances on top of its shattered remains. She’s a sight to behold.
A complete stylistic 180 from her somber directorial debut The Lost Daughter, writer/director Maggie Gyllenhaal’s The Bride! is a bonkers, maximalist feature dealing with serious themes through a tapestry of dark humor, song-and-dance numbers, goofy moments, and go-for-broke performances. It’s an exhilarating experience when you see a film that’s utterly cinematic, a film that’s making bold choices you don’t often see, a film that flaunts its audacity. Gyllenhaal’s ability to write and direct two totally different kinds of movies back to back demonstrates remarkable filmmaking talent that makes me excited to see what she will create in the future.