Die My Love
review by Bobby Blakey
Director Lynne Ramsey has been delivering unique films with compelling stories for years including We Need To Talk About Kevin and You Were Never Really Here. Her latest film Die My Love, based on Ariana Harwicz’s celebrated novel, brings together a great cast including Jennifer Lawrence, Robert Pattison, Sissy Spacek, LaKeith Stanfield and Nick Nolte. Could this film offer yet another unique vision for or will it fail to find its own sanity?
Die My Love follows Grace and her partner Jackson, who have recently moved into an old house deep in the country. With ambitions to write The Great American Novel, Grace settles into her new environment, and the couple welcome a baby soon after. However, with Jackson frequently – and suspiciously – absent, and the pressures of domestic life starting to weigh on her, Grace begins to unravel, leaving a path of destruction in her wake.
Right out the gate you know this film is going to be an interesting experience. After seeing the film in its entirety, I still don’t quite know how I feel about the finished product but can definitely say that it has a lot to say and is impactful in a sometimes-confusing way depending on how connected you let yourself be. The story seems simple at first, but as it plays out it starts stacking more and more layers that can get you lost in the narrative as it lets you into her own experience.
The genius of the film is this almost confusing nature as it weaves in and out of the timeline at one point before getting back linear but still gets you lost at times. This always brings you back and forces you to start questioning everything right up until the last shot. This is the kind of film that will leave some lost or even angry about
where it goes and others will see the brilliance of it all of understanding what it is dealing with.
Where there is no denying is in the performances across the board with Lawrence and Pattison leading the charge. While both are fantastic here this is Lawrence stepping front and center to deliver another performance that reminds you why she blew up so quickly early in her career. She is outstanding here, bringing so many layers of sadness, isolation, depression, love, passion, sexual frustration and so much more to the forefront of this character. As the film moves on, she slowly descends into a state that you can’t quite figure out but it’s not good.
Pattison, while being the more grounded character in the relationship, is far from healthy. He brings a whole different set of emotions and challenges to the role as he tries to navigate this situation and his own feelings and shortcomings in it all. They have great chemistry in this dysfunctional relationship that showcases passion and love along with everything that can and does can go wrong. The ending to the film is clear to where it is going but makes you wonder how much of what you just witnessed actually happened this way or is there more delusion here than you might have originally thought.
This film won’t work for everyone, and it is a strange slow pace through most of its run time, but the more I sit with it the more depth I grasp and respect I have for it. It’s not a commercial film filled with butterflies and rainbows nor is it trying to be. It is a journey into real-life issues and the toll it can take on everyone involved leaving you affected when it’s all said and done in some way.
Decide for yourself and give Die My Love a chance in theaters now from Mubi.