Love Lies Bleeding (2024)

A weird thing happened in the world lately. And by the world, I mean what goes on in my head. Kristen Stewart, the chick from Twilight, who I've never found attractive previously, suddenly became hot. And not in the usual way. She became hot when she became... dykey. She used to be awkwardly gawky and lean in a bad way; the kind of lame faux-punk chick that losers who listen to Green Day go for. Now she's pooning women all over the place, got a hardass "men are scum" look in her eye and is really leaning into the lesbo look, and it works wonders for her. Ironically, the more she looks like she wouldn't fuck me, the more keen I am on fucking her.

Love Lies Bleeding is her at peak-dyke aesthetic and it's hot as fuck. She plays a singlet-wearing, mullet-sporting rugmuncher, who meets a beefcake muscle mommy. They smash clams and - lesbians being lesbians - decide to live together the next day. Which is all good, except Kristen's dad is a douchey gun smuggler, her brother-in-law is a wifebashing piece of shit and her new GF starts getting serious bouts of roid-rage.

Admittedly, there's some dumb shit in this movie. But it works because there's a welcome streak of exploitation throughout. Maybe not a Trash Epic per se, but it ticks some trash boxes. Nasty gore, dirty sex, sweaty neo-noir aesthetics and both of our leading femme-fatales get their tits out. Plus there's Ed Harris rocking a skullet. And Kristen Stewart. And her tits.

I was hesitant about checking this out, because modern 'female empowerment' flicks tend to have a bombardment of social commentary in place of a plot (looking at you Promising Young Woman). Not so here. Just a bunch of good (although sparsely drawn) characters played well by committed actors in a powder-keg scenario that's destined to damage all involved, with some pleasing dykesploitation thrown in. Good times.