Rose Glass’s new riotous, gritty, neon-hued crime thriller takes its name from an Algernon Charles Swinburne poem. “Love lies bleeding in the bed whereover / Roses lean with smiling mouths or pleading: / Earth lies laughing where the sun’s dart clove her: / Love lies bleeding.” Love itself is a wounded thing, so to be in love is inherently painful.

This notion – that, fundamentally, love hurts – echoes across Glass’s Love Lies Bleeding, which lands in cinemas today. It’s a far-fetched, modern fable of a film that celebrates queer love along with a certain dangerous, thrilling amorality.

Kristen Stewart gives her signature mumblecore performance as Lou, a loner working in a rural, grimy gym as a begrudging receptionist in the 1980s. Her life is dull and colourless until Jackie (Katy O’Brian in a star-making turn after her breakout in The Mandalorian), a hopeful bodybuilder, rocks up from out of town and begins training at the gym.

There’s an instant, powerful sexual spark and, within about 24 hours, Jackie has moved in with Lou, who is more than happy to play house with her new lover, making Jackie egg white omelettes and delicately pumping her full of steroids. True love, right? 

Things take a decidedly grizzly turn when, amped up on steroids, Jackie murders Lou’s abusive brother-in-law, JJ (Dave Franco). Her impulsive act of violence unravels a thread of hidden family crime in Lou’s past. Things eventually come to a brutal, surreal head in a stand-off with Lou’s bug-breeding crime boss dad, Lou Sr (a deeply unsettling and scraggly Ed Harris).

Love Lies Bleeding is the second feature to come from Glass, whose first outing, Saint Maud, established her as a visionary new British director with a real eye for visceral cinema. Stewart is at her best as Lou – her signature understated performance leads to some moments of unexpected satirical humour as she responds to sudden gory scenes with mere quizzical confusion. O’Brian’s turn as Jackie is heartfelt and filled with both vulnerability and an ever-present undercurrent of danger.

The film ultimately takes a thrillingly bold surreal turn, ending on a fantastical, almost mythical note. In Lou and Jackie’s world, love really is painful – and love is gross, gory, cruel, and even dangerous. But ultimately, it’s still totally worth it.