Several years ago, Martin Scorsese introduced his book club to Die, My Love, a novel by Argentinian author Ariana Harwicz. The book follows an unnamed woman who moves to rural France with her husband, where isolation and frustration push her against the confines of marriage and motherhood. Describing herself as “a nutcase” and “someone beyond repair,” she commits unspeakable acts, swearing at her child and confessing a profound regret she feels unable to voice aloud.
Convinced Jennifer Lawrence was the only actress who could embody the role, Scorsese sent the novel to her production company. Lawrence and her producing partner, Justine Ciarrocchi, in turn, had only one director in mind: Lynne Ramsay, the Scottish filmmaker whose career has been a sustained exploration of the dark side of family dynamics.
Ramsay’s work has long excavated uncomfortable truths. Her 1999 debut, Ratcatcher, an unflinching look at a boy’s life after he accidentally drowns another child during Glasgow’s 1973 bin strikes, remains one of the UK’s greatest first films. She gained international acclaim with her third feature, 2011’s We Need to Talk About Kevin. Adapted from Lionel Shriver’s novel, the film starred Tilda Swinton as a mother grappling with guilt after her alienated son commits a school massacre.
Given her thematic preoccupations, Ramsay was a natural fit for Die, My Love, yet she was initially hesitant. “Jennifer got in touch with me out of the blue,” Ramsay explains. “It’s a beautiful piece of writing, but I wasn’t sure how I could adapt it; it’s quite surrealist.” Wary of repeating herself, she adds, “I suppose I was wary because I didn’t want to make a film like We Need to Talk About Kevin again.”
However, Lawrence’s commitment to exploring the character’s depths proved persuasive. “Jennifer was pretty willing, saying that she wanted to go all out, to see where the role might take her,” Ramsay says. She soon found her own way into the material, realizing that despite their struggles, the protagonist and her husband still love each other. “There’s a satellite love story at the heart of the film,” she notes. “And, of course, the mother is feral and unapologetic, which is still cutting-edge. That was my way in.”
Co-written with Enda Walsh (Hunger) and Alice Birch (Normal People, Succession), and with Scorsese as a producer, the film became Die My Love. Lawrence stars as Grace, who relocates with her husband, Jackson (Robert Pattinson), from New York to the rural American West, near his parents (Sissy Spacek and Nick Nolte). The film is a magnificent meditation on motherhood, anchored by a terrific performance from Lawrence that is already generating Oscar buzz.
At first, the couple revels in their newfound freedom, but the arrival of their child shifts the dynamic. Jackson is often away for work, leaving Grace, a writer, unable to create. She lashes out against the loneliness and boredom of her new life, fantasizing about a neighbor (LaKeith Stanfield) and challenging a fellow mother’s denial of motherhood’s isolating reality. When her mother-in-law dismisses her struggles by saying all new mothers are “a little loopy,” Grace later clarifies her problem isn’t with her son: “it’s everything else that’s fucked.”
The film shares a cinematic lineage with Terrence Malick’s Badlands and John Cassavetes’s 1974 classic A Woman Under the Influence. “The Cassavetes film is about the epic in the everyday, what’s going on under the surface,” Ramsay says. “As Peter Falk’s Nick loves Gena Rowlands’s Mabel, so Jackson loves Grace, but neither man knows what to do with his woman.”
While many critics have interpreted Grace’s behavior as postpartum depression, Ramsay sees it as more layered. “I related to her writer’s block, to her sex life going totally to pot and other universal struggles,” she says, noting Grace is ultimately trying to feel something amid the numbness of isolation. “There’s a truth in Grace cutting through the bullshit with people that appeals to me.”
To capture this raw emotional landscape, Ramsay fosters an environment of intense trust with her actors. For Die My Love, this involved five weeks of preparation for a 35-day shoot and a bold decision to film the sex scenes on the very first day. “It was a risk, but it broke the ice,” she laughs. “Jennifer and Robert, who hadn’t worked together before, really clicked. They just had chemistry.”
Ramsay’s path to becoming a director was unconventional. After studying photography, she was accepted into the National Film and Television School for cinematography but was quickly encouraged to direct. Her first short film, Small Deaths (1996), won an award at Cannes, setting the stage for Ratcatcher. Though she has made only four features since, a fact she attributes to the industry’s unpredictability and difficult experiences on abandoned projects like The Lovely Bones and Jane Got a Gun, her commitment to her vision remains absolute. “Protecting my own voice is important to me,” she states.
In a challenging climate for independent cinema, Ramsay’s singular approach continues to resonate. Die My Love was acquired by Mubi at Cannes for a reported $24 million, and her earlier films are finding new audiences. For her, success is simple: “A film that stands the test of time.”
Currently developing an adaptation of Margaret Atwood’s Stone Mattress and a project about AI for Margot Robbie’s production company, Ramsay is pragmatic but uncompromising. “I’m still making films my way, sticking to my guns and holding on to my integrity.” This spirit is perfectly captured at the end of Die My Love, where Ramsay herself sings a cover of Joy Division’s “Love Will Tear Us Apart.” Her tender, gorgeous vocal transforms the original’s abrasive energy, suggesting that while love may indeed tear us apart, it is also what will ultimately survive.
Die My Love is in cinemas from 7 November.
