Amidst Rumors And Release Date Delay, Maggie Gyllenhaal Doubled Down On The Bride And Her ‘Radical’ Vision

It’s been a weird pre-release for Maggie Gyllenhaal’s The Bride! The eccentric and buzzy musical reimagining of Bride Of Frankenstein was considered a strong awards contender when it was first announced, but a studio swap, rumors about the budget, a release date change and even speculation about possible reshoots have made it fodder for a lot of industry gossip, especially over the past few weeks. Amidst all the talk, however, Maggie Gyllenhaal took to the CinemaCon stage to present some footage and talk about her “radical vision,” and for the record, I’m still ready to escort this movie down the aisle.

Gyllenhaal made the appearance as part of Warner Bros’ larger presentation at CinemaCon (which we live blogged). She was joined by star Jessie Buckley, and it was quite obvious they’re both very excited about the project. Buckley referred to it as the “punkest love that’s ever existed” and talked about how all the film’s complicated camera angles and extensive pre-production got her really excited about IMAX. Gyllenhaal gushed about how the original Bride has this “wild disobedience” to her and said after watching the original Frankenstein, she couldn’t stop obsessing over this idea of the Bride coming back and not fitting into any of the boxes imagined for her.

They also showed off footage, and while I wasn’t there, several of my colleagues were and said it was among the most memorable they’ve seen the entire week. One told me it’s “campy, violent and bizarre.” Another told me they’re “intrigued” because it could be “fantastic or terrible.” They both said they want to see the entire movie as soon as possible because it looks so creatively different from the bigger budget stuff we normally get from the major studios.

Unfortunately, as I said in the intro, we’re in for a much longer wait than was originally planned. In fact, a lot of plans seem to have gone sideways with this movie. The original one was to make it with Netflix providing the financing, but at some point, that deal fell through. Warner Bros stepped in and allegedly gave Gyllenhaal somewhere between $80 and $100M to execute her unusual vision. That’s what she did, and those involved with the actual movie seem very excited by the end result, but then the rumors started to spread. Maybe it cost more money than expected? Maybe it’s not commercially viable because it’s too weird?

Ultimately, we don’t really know what’s going on, except that the movie moved its release date from September of this year to March of next year. That could mean there’s going to be some reshoots or an additional cut produced and test screened. That could mean Warner Bros no longer sees The Bride! as an awards contender (probably because it’s too out there) and instead thinks there’s more money to be made in March. It could mean a lot of things.

I’m sure Warner Bros probably has feelings about all the rumors and all this talk about The Bride!, but to be honest, it just makes me more excited to see the whole movie. I like things that are artsy. I like big swings, and I like people trying to do something new and original. That’s more interesting to me than watching a slightly different version of the same movie I’ve already seen a thousand times. So, bring on The Bride!