Before Love Lies Bleeding premiered at the 2024 Sundance Film Festival to strong reviews, star Kristen Stewart teased that the sex scenes in the A24 movie will “shock” people. She added, “It was really sexy. And I don’t mean from an outsider’s perspective: I felt turned on by it, and it was cool to have people witness that.” You can now see the sex scenes — and the romance and violence and Ed Harris looking super creepy — for yourself in the trailer above.
Director Rose Glass told Indiewire that she asked the cast, including Stewart and Katy O’Brian (who bonded over cat pee), to watch films like Crash (the good one) and Showgirls to prepare for Love Lies Bleeding. “That was a weird list of films I put together,” she said. “I don’t think many of them I was conscious of while we were writing, we were really just focusing on these characters and this story and the tone. So it was really more in hindsight, as we’re in prep, trying to sort of give [the cast] of the world this story takes place in.”
Here’s the official plot synopsis:
From Director Rose Glass comes an electric new love story; reclusive gym manager Lou falls hard for Jackie, an ambitious bodybuilder headed through town to Vegas in pursuit of her dream. But their love ignites violence, pulling them deep into the web of Lou’s criminal family.
Love Lies Bleeding, which also stars Jena Malone, Anna Baryshnikov, and Dave Franco, opens in theaters on March 8th.