LOVE LIES BLEEDING (2024) **

Kristen Stewart stars as Lou, a lesbian who works behind the register at a skeevy gym.  When she sees musclebound Jackie (Katy O’Brien) working out, it’s love at first sight.  Only thing standing in the way of their happiness is the fact that Jackie got all roided up and killed Lou’s asshole brother in-law (Dave Franco).  Naturally, it doesn’t take long before even more bodies start mounting up. 

Love Lies Bleeding is a wannabe neo-noir that never quite comes together.  The gymnasium setting is novel and the sequence where O’Brien hightails it to Vegas to enroll in a bodybuilding competition when she should be lying low from the cops is kind of fun.  However, the plot is often messy, and the various complications seem more arbitrary than anything. 

Maybe my expectations were to blame.  They don’t make too many LGBT neo-noirs nowadays and I guess I got my hopes up thinking this was gonna be the next Bound or something.  Instead, what we got is a frustrating experience.  The film is strangely inert and uninvolving, and when it does try to color outside the lines the results are unintentionally laughable.  I’m thinking specifically of the end scene where (SPOILERS obviously) Katy hulks out and turns into the 50 Foot Woman to protect K-Stew from her evil dad (Ed Harris).  Yes, I know it’s all a steroid-induced dream, but it serves as more of a question mark at the end of the film rather than an exclamation point. 

Sadly, there are very little sparks between the two lead actresses.  They engage in some brief lovemaking, but it’s nothing overly graphic or titillating.  Stewart could do this sort of thing in her sleep by now and she looks halfway tempted to hit the snooze button.  O’Brien does prove to have a unique screen presence about her though.  If anything, the film should act as a serviceable calling card for her for the next few years or so.