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What. Was. That.
There is something called the "Norbit" Effect. It is now almost an annual tradition to have a prohibitive Oscar winner appear in total garbage during awards season. Eddie Murphy was inches from winning Best Supporting Actor for Dreamgirls until the monstrosity known as Norbit derailed his bid. A few years back, Eddie Redmayne shamed his way into winning Best Actor for The Theory of Everything, managing to survive the monstrosity that is Jupiter Ascending. Now, it is Jessie Buckley's turn to fight against The Norbit Effect. As of this writing, she is seen as the de facto Best Actress winner for Hamnet. If she does win, it will be a good thing that The Bride! was not released during the Oscar voting period. The Bride! is a monstrosity in every way possible.
The ghost of Mary Shelley (Jessie Buckley) speaks to us from beyond the grave. She is frustrated by death, unable to tell the story of the Bride of Frankenstein that she wanted to. However, now there is a chance. Mary Shelley will possess the body of Ida (Buckley in a dual role). Ida is a gangster's moll in 1936 Chicago. Restaurant patrons are startled to see this broad gyrate bizarrely, speak with a strong British accent in a rapid-fire stream of consciousness manner. She rambles too much about the machinations of mob boss Lupino (Zlatko Buric). Eventually, the two hoods with her kill her, albeit accidentally.
Into this comes "Frank" (Christian Bale). He is Frankenstein's Monster, still wandering the world. He is also still lonely and in need of female companionship. The Monster Demands a Mate. Who better to help in that cause than local mad scientist Dr. Cornelia Euphronious (Annette Bening). The bad doctor encourages Frank to stay at her hospital for observation, though she is unaware that he routinely sneaks off to see the movies of his favorite performer, Ronnie Reed (Jake Gyllenhaal). Dr. Euphronious agrees to find a corpse. It is that of Ida. Ida, who was (is?) possessed by the ghost of Mary Shelley.
It is becoming rather convoluted, isn't it?
The revival is a success, though the newly reanimated Bride has no memory of who she is. Of course, they are going to hit the Depression-era rave scene. Here though, Frank kills to protect his Bride. Now, they are on the run. Pursuing them is weary Detective Jake Wiles (Peter Sarsgaard) and his Girl Friday, Myrna Malloy (Penelope Cruz). Truth be told, Malloy is the real brains of the operation, but her brilliance cannot shine because she is a woman.
Frank and The Bride now go on a crime spree across the nation. Her rebellious nature inspires other women into fighting against their men. They are part of the "Brain Attack". They encounter Ronnie Reed, who is less than thrilled to find fan Frank gushing over him. Wiles and Malloy also find Frank and The Bride. Wiles recognizes her as his moll mole, one whom he slept with. As the crime wave rolls on, will the monster version of Bonnie & Clyde relive to happiness? Will Malloy triumph over the patriarchy?
The Bride! has distinguished itself early in the year of our Lord 2026 as perhaps the worst film of the year. And we are barely in March. I attended a screening with four people counting myself and my cousin. He fell asleep. The elderly couple there walked out early in The Bride! Seeing one of them push herself as fast as she could on her walker proved a better sight than The Bride! itself.
The Bride! is a disaster. A sheer, total, absolute disaster. It is as if everyone involved were asked "what bad decision could we make?" and managed to find one even worse than whatever had been suggested. I am an honest reviewer, and I cannot say that I hated The Bride! I can say though, that whatever enjoyment I found in The Bride! came from seeing alleged professionals make fools out of themselves.
I opted for the second reaction. I had already broken out in chuckles at certain parts of The Bride! However, seeing this frenetically shot number, with the backup dancers moving about equally crazed, as Frank and the Missus are dancing to the Irving Berlin classic was too much. You don't have a Frankenstein movie where you have the characters break out into Putting on the Ritz and expect to be taken seriously.
What possessed them to echo, not the 1935 The Bride of Frankenstein, but Young Frankenstein instead? Christian Bale, Jessie Buckley and Penelope Cruz might, might get a pass if they genuinely were not aware of the 1974 Mel Brooks spoof. It is a stretch to think that Gyllenhaal, her brother and husband (who both appear in the film) were not aware of it. However, was every extra and crewmember also totally unaware of how flat-out stupid their version of Putting on the Ritz would look? I have read somewhere that they were fully aware of the Young Frankenstein connection. It, per my understanding, was meant as metacommentary. If so, it was dumber than I give them credit for.
Many have commented on how The Bride! ends with Bobby "Boris" Pickett's novelty song Monster Mash while various Brain Attack femmes torture Lupino. The question that should be asked is if The Bride! was meant as a comedy or a serious film. I think it was just a case of the filmmakers raging and rambling incoherently.
The plot, such as it is, makes no sense. Why would the ghost of Mary Shelley, apparently trapped in a vague netherworld, select some flapper floozy to tell her story? Moreover, a lot of The Bride! seems to forget this part. Poor Mary Shelley just pops up at random. Add to that this bit of oddity. Shelley wrote the novel. However, "Frank" is real. This flapper floozy, whom Mary Shelley possesses from beyond the grave, ends up as the Bride of Frankenstein that Mary Shelley would have written about if not for the patriarchy.
It is all gibberish. Total gibberish.
Christian Bale, fellow Oscar-winner, looks bored throughout. He did his job, though apparently with no enthusiasm. Annette Bening looked appropriately crazed as Dr. C. Euphronious (she has to place her initial because sexism). She was leaning in on the idea that The Bride! was a spoof, at least judging on her performance. Jeannie Berlin plays the housekeeper Greta like a cross between Una O'Connor's Minnie in The Bride of Frankenstein and Cloris Leachman's Frau Blucher in Young Frankenstein. Truth be told, Berlin made Leachman look like Jessie Buckley in Hamnet by comparison.
Both Peter Sarsgaard and Penelope Cruz look like they wandered in from a whole other genre. They played their roles like they were in a film noir spoof. Sarsgaard's Detective Wiles looked more bored than Bale. I get that he was meant to be "world-weary". It just looked as if he was sleep deprived. Penelope Cruz's whole role is odd. No one apparently wonders why "Myrna Malloy" has a strong Spanish accent. Apparently, Myrna is the real brains behind the investigation, with Wiles just the front man. She, however, was unaware that Wiles had schtupped Ida prior to her killing.
I have seen comparisons to Joker: Folie a Deux when it comes to The Bride! Those comparisons are very warranted. It's some kind of horror musical comedy. It is incoherent. It is a terrible thing to sit through. It thinks it is far cleverer than it actually is.
The Bride! has nothing to recommend it unless it is to laugh at it. Those who are not lulled to sleep with it will find endless about of untended laughter at The Bride! It was no graveyard smash.
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