DIE, MY LOVE - Review | Cannes Film Festival 2025

Lynne Ramsay's latest film serves as a masterful showcase for Jennifer Lawrence's extreme acting who doesn't hold anything back when portraying a mother dealing with postpartum depression. Even with Robert Pattinson providing more of the charm as her husband, seeing Lawrence's escalation to insanity makes it a provocative journey to witness along with reaching a moment where its harder to sense a clarified point in time within the film. However, despite a fascinating set up involving its erotic conflicts and spontaneous but distinct rock music choices that provide more memorability to certain scenes. It gets to a point where the story stops feeling like it progresses as it repeats the same actions of madness until the end of the runtime. Thus, the meandering story, some poor fire effects, and realizing that the film's premise/themes were better explored in Ramsay's other film We Need to Talk about Kevin (2011), it makes her latest outing a dynamic but at times uneven psychological thriller.

Still Courtesy - MUBI

Grace (portrayed by Jennifer Lawrence) and Jackson (portrayed by Robert Pattinson) are a married couple that make the decision to settle down at his uncle's old house in Montana and start a family. Thus, they have a baby, refurbish the secluded house, Jackson suddenly gets a dog who Grace is not the most fond of. Even with people like Grace's mother named Pam (portrayed by Sissy Spacek) along with more people to support this new phase of her life, that doesn't stop Grace from having the aftermath of giving birth and settling down affect her mental state that only gets worse as time passes by.

After almost a decade of being absent from filmmaking with her last movie You Were Never Really Here (2017), Lynne Ramsay returns with an audacious and provocative psychological thriller that places Jennifer Lawrence front and center in a harrowing role as a mother grappling with the suffocating weight of postpartum depression. Lawrence’s performance is nothing short of mesmerizing—her portrayal of a woman unraveling is visceral, raw, and unrelenting. There are no half-measures in her approach; she immerses herself completely into the psyche of a character slowly spiraling into madness. The intensity of her emotional breakdowns is matched only by the starkness of the visual composition, which forces the audience to remain trapped within her distorted reality. In this respect, Ramsay’s direction shines through, creating an unnerving atmosphere that blurs the line between reality and delusion, pulling the viewer deeper into the chaos.

The film’s psychological intensity is complemented by Robert Pattinson’s performance as the husband, whose quieter charm serves as a stark contrast to Lawrence’s explosive energy. Pattinson plays his role with a sense of restrained concern, offering moments of tenderness, though his character’s lack of presence in key emotional scenes creates a noticeable disconnect. This absence is a deliberate choice by Ramsay, who seems more focused on exploring the internal collapse of the mother than the relationship dynamics between the couple. The film hints at erotic and power struggles, but these moments never quite coalesce into a larger, more compelling narrative about their troubled marriage. Despite this, the unpredictable and at times jarring use of rock music—often evoking a sense of rebellion and anguish—gives certain scenes an almost surreal quality, ensuring that the film leaves a lingering impression even if it doesn’t always move forward in a conventional sense.

However, while Die, My Love is a film that thrives in its audacity and ambition, its pacing becomes erratic as it enters the final stretch. The story, after a riveting buildup, begins to stagnate, as the protagonist's descent into madness repeats in circular patterns, leaving the audience with a sense of emotional exhaustion rather than catharsis. By the end of the film, the narrative's forward momentum has become so lost that it’s difficult to tell whether the character is truly experiencing time as it is or whether we, too, have been sucked into her warped perception of it. The repetition feels almost deliberate, but it risks frustrating viewers who are hoping for more narrative progression or resolution. In this way, Ramsay’s storytelling can feel a bit too indulgent at times, as it seems to prioritize emotional chaos over a clearer narrative thread.

Ultimately, Die, My Love doesn’t fully escape the shadow of Ramsay’s previous work, We Need to Talk About Kevin (2011), which explored similar themes of trauma, motherhood, and violence. While Die, My Love attempts to push the boundaries of psychological horror, it often comes across as a thematic rehash. The exploration of motherhood and mental illness here feels less impactful, despite Lawrence’s formidable performance. Certain elements, like the lackluster fire effects and the film’s sometimes meandering plot, detract from what could have been a more nuanced, focused exploration of maternal breakdown. Nonetheless, Ramsay's film is still a striking exercise in discomfort and psychological unraveling, one that leaves a lasting impression, even if it doesn’t fully cohere in the way that her earlier work did.

Verdict

7/10

Still Courtesy - MUBI