{"id":262435,"date":"2025-11-05T03:02:10","date_gmt":"2025-11-05T03:02:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/262435\/"},"modified":"2025-11-05T03:02:10","modified_gmt":"2025-11-05T03:02:10","slug":"jennifer-lawrence-goes-feral-for-nothing-in-facile-psychological-drama-die-my-love","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/262435\/","title":{"rendered":"Jennifer Lawrence goes feral for nothing in facile psychological drama Die My Love"},"content":{"rendered":"

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

Jennifer Lawrence in a scene from Die My Love.Kimberly French\/The Associated Press<\/p>\n

Die My Love<\/p>\n

Directed by Lynne Ramsay<\/p>\n

Written by Lynne Ramsay, Enda Walsh and Alice Birch, based on the novel by Ariana Harwicz<\/p>\n

Starring Jennifer Lawrence, Robert Pattinson and Sissy Spacek <\/p>\n

Classification N\/A; 118 minutes<\/p>\n

Opens in select theatres Nov. 7 <\/p>\n

\u201cUh-oh \u2013 we\u2019ve got rats.\u201d <\/p>\n

It is only a few seconds into the new and torturous psychological drama Die My Love, and director Lynne Ramsay punctures what threatens to be a bucolic scene \u2013 a young couple surveying their country home, vast fields stretching out in the sunny background \u2013 with a rusty blade of menace. <\/p>\n

The rodent discovery is made by Jackson (Robert Pattinson), a charming but dishevelled good ol\u2019 boy who has brought his love, Grace (Jennifer Lawrence), out to the middle of the Montana sticks to start their life together. And rats are the least of their \u2013 or Ramsay\u2019s \u2013 problems.<\/p>\n

Moving to the dilapidated farmhouse for reasons both practical (Jackson\u2019s parents, played by Sissy Spacek and Nick Nolte, are nearby) and delusional (maybe all this open space will give Grace the freedom to write her novel), the lovers quickly spiral into a vortex of violent depression. <\/p>\n

It doesn\u2019t help that Jackson is a wildly selfish loser, practically abandoning Grace as soon as she gives birth to their son \u2013 and so unconcerned with his extramarital actions that he leaves condom wrappers scattered around like bread crumbs. <\/p>\n

The baby and his constant need for care and attention of course don\u2019t help Grace\u2019s mindset, but as the film drags on, it becomes clear that Ramsay isn\u2019t solely interested in a portrait of postpartum depression. (Even if that is the centre of its source material, a 2012 Spanish novel by Ariana Harwicz.)<\/p>\n

There is something more rotten and incurable about Grace and her relationship to the outside world \u2013 an ugly collision of narcissism and selfishness, fragility and obliviousness \u2013 that is driving, and ultimately clouding, Ramsay\u2019s vision. Unable to climb to any clear narrative or aesthetic vantage point, the filmmaker resorts to pushing through a clanging, suffocating experience.<\/p>\n

According to its distributor, Die My Love underwent a re-edit from the version that played at the Cannes Film Festival this past spring<\/a> \u2013 but whatever changes made feel exceptionally minor, as the movie still plays like a rote nightmare. While Ramsay has never been a subtle filmmaker, the magnificent darkness that she has previously conjured in everything from Morvern Callar to You Were Never Really Here<\/a> felt sincere and enveloping \u2013 vortexes you appreciated being thrown into. <\/p>\n

Here, everything arrives dripping wet with artifice, from the rotting-before-our-eyes country home to the buzzing-flies on the assaultive sound mix to the forest-fire imagery that bookends Grace\u2019s journey. <\/p>\n

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

Lawrence, left, and Robert Pattinson in a scene from Die My Love.Kimberly French\/The Associated Press<\/p>\n

In a more controlled and less punishing film, Lawrence\u2019s deeply committed performance<\/a> would be the discussion of the year. Yet she has tossed herself to the wolves here, the star provided no care or cover by her director. What is the point in going so raw, so feral, if the result is so scattered, so interminable, so irredeemably silly? It is The Emperor\u2019s New Clothes of empty, naked-for-naked sake acting, and no one here with the brief exception of Spacek \u2013 who leapfrogs over the ludicrous dialogue she is handed \u2013 walks away clean. <\/p>\n

In too many ways, Ramsay\u2019s film recalls another question mark in Lawrence\u2019s career, Darren Aronofsky\u2019s Mother!<\/a>. But while both films share common threads in their star, themes, rural-home settings and particularly traumatic moments involving sinks, Aronofsky at least had a method behind his madness.<\/p>\n

You don\u2019t have to press your ear against this movie\u2019s wall to hear its many rats \u2013 the scurrying is deafening, and to what end god only knows. Better to burn the house down and walk away. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Open this photo in gallery: Jennifer Lawrence in a scene from Die My Love.Kimberly French\/The Associated Press Die…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":262436,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[49,48,75,337,2922],"class_list":{"0":"post-262435","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-movies","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-entertainment","11":"tag-movies","12":"tag-noastack"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/262435","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=262435"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/262435\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/262436"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=262435"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=262435"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=262435"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}