THE BRIDE!

From its first moments, 'The Bride!' is an intense event. Without spoiling it, you learn the device behind Buckley's character within the opening minute or two, and the film is an unrestrained experience from that moment forward. It is, at many moments, an uncomfortable watch - in the fury of its pace, in its cinematography, and in its violence. It's designed to be so. It's sending a message about female strength, power and control, and while this story is set almost 100 years ago, much is still relevant to the modern world we live in.

Much of the film's power comes squarely from the increasingly impressive work on display from Jessie Buckley. This is just the latest in a series of roles for the actor that show how much she has been misvalued and diminished in previous years, and it's only now that the full radiance of her talent is beginning to be revealed. The duality of her role here is beyond mind-boggling; I feel like I need another viewing of 'The Bride! just to take her performance in fully. The mental hoops that she pulls the audience through along the story's way are equal to that of the physical manipulation she undergoes, her body a puppet to the emotions swirling inside her character's reanimated, chaotic brain.

This story is about more than just refocusing the story on The Bride. It's also about society's attitude toward anything it deems different, and in this way, Christian Bale's Frank is her ideal partner in crime. He's physically far more of a "monster" than she is, and when things begin going awry for them, he is acutely aware that the attitudes of the public are no different at that time than they were in the late 18th century. That's why we see an attachment form between the two - they endure shared experiences, but she also takes the time to get to know him and has the opportunity to see him as he truly is, someone who is lonely, who tries to do the right thing, who loves that which is beautiful in the world.

While The Bride's is the central story, and hers and Frank's is the tale intertwined with that, there are so many offshoots in Maggie Gyllenhaal's script that make this thoroughly fixating. Naturally, being set in Chicago in the early 20th century, the criminal underworld becomes prevalent, and they end up on the trail of our two antiheroes. The story of the police pursuit of the pair has its own spinoff storyline; most pleasing is Penélope Cruz's Myrna Mallow, who's struggling to be recognised as a female detective on the force. All of this keeps the plot moving along at a frenetic pace, except for a few moments when The Bride and Frank are on the run and appear to be dallying while the others catch up.

The other perhaps odd addition to my synopsis was Jake Gyllenhaal's character. However, Ronnie Reed is our window into Frank's imagination, and therefore the rationale for the vast majority of the film's musical numbers. Jake Gyllenhaal's very demure dances set to very sedate tunes sit in direct juxtaposition to those displayed by The Bride and Frank: a whir of colour and camera movement and jolting motions and sexual energy. They are assembled by Maggie Gyllenhaal, cinematographer Lawrence Sher ('Joker', 'Godzilla: King of the Monsters') and the film's choreographers Michelle Dorrance, Or Schraiber and Bobbi Jene Smith to create a furious sensory experience for the audience. It's deliberately not something of its time, full of life and exuberance and wildness - a full-bodied reflection of who these characters are.

'The Bride!' simply isn't the kind of film Hollywood is making these days. Like its lead character, it's outspoken and rambunctious and uncontrollable, driven by a power bubbling from deep inside Jessie Buckley. Its messages remain vital to avoiding complacency in a world that, more often than not, rewards it. This is a rebellious yell from Maggie Gyllenhaal that must be heard far and wide by as many people as possible.