In Tayarisha Poe’s “The Young Wife,” a wedding party plays out like a psychedelic fever dream. The camera keens and swoops, birdlike, around the guests — who are decked out in neon eye shadow and bright pastel-colored outfits — and a synth-heavy score lends the whole affair a hint of the uncanny.
But beneath these quirks, Poe’s dramedy tells a tale as old as time (or at least as old as “Runaway Bride”): of a woman who has cold feet before marriage.
Celestina (Kiersey Clemons) is a burned-out corporate lackey who has quit her job in a fit of rage days before tying the knot with River (Leon Bridges), a lawyer-turned-cupcake-baker. She hasn’t yet broken the news to her relatives and friends, whom she has gathered in a family home in the countryside for what she insists is a party, not a wedding. As she waits for her fiancé, who is delayed by inclement weather, to arrive, her guests buzz around her like candy-colored flies, pestering her.
Her soon-to-be sisters-in-law can’t stop talking about pregnancy and children; her best friend is aghast when she discovers that Celestina has given up a lucrative career; her imperious mother disapproves of the marriage; and her fiancé’s sick grandmother, played by a purple-haired Judith Light, begrudgingly lugs around an oxygen tank and tries to convince Celestina to help euthanize her.
The film’s cacophony of voices, and a spotlight that roves across the party guests, creates a storm of light, color and sound in the midst of which Celestina ponders existential questions. Does she want to be a “wife,” with all the baggage that implies? Was it worth it to quit her corporate job in search of an elusive peace?
These are familiar, even hackneyed themes, which make the film’s relentless theatrics feel gratuitous and somewhat exhausting. Style overpowers substance, though Poe’s fantastic eye for composition and Clemons’s vivacious screen presence are undeniable.
The Young Wife
Rated R for talk of death, weed and capitalism’s disappointments. Running time: 1 hour 37 minutes. In theaters and available to rent or buy on most major platforms.
