‘Bride Hard’ REVIEW: A struggle of work-life balance, and of being a quality film

‘Bride Hard’ REVIEW: A struggle of work-life balance, and of being a quality film

Martin Yenko July 22, 2025, 06:00 PM

Sam (Rebel Wilson) aiming an RPG | Screenshot from the film’s official trailer

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One of the perpetual struggles of adulthood is balancing your personal priorities and maintaining your social bonds. Of course, I’m pretty sure most of us have refused at least one invitation to hang out with friends in the past due to complications with a job or college academics, or even skimped on those priorities for a good time. It is a pretty difficult needle to thread, and even more difficult to truly master.

Enter Sam (Rebel Wilson), who’s currently not only struggling with her job as a secret agent because of her off-the-cuff violent ways of execution missions, but also being a good buddy and maid of honor to her childhood best friend Betsy (Anna Camp) while she’s consistently being interrupted with new assignments. When both her team and her friend group ultimately turn on her for what they perceive as inadequacies, Sam’s in-organization psychologist Nadine (Sherry Cola) gives her an imperative to relax at Betsy’s upcoming wedding on a private island, away from all the field work in order to give her time to unwind. 

Sure enough, Sam’s stay is not the most relaxed, as she’s not only forced to deal with the awkward emotional distance between her and her friends — as revealing her secret occupation may result in deadly consequences — but also deal with a sudden appearance of a mercenary team holding the guests hostage for financial means.

Work-life balance has never been this hard. And, to my absolute bafflement, so is doing this premise justice, because this might be one of the more inanely frustrating films of the year so far.

Sam (Rebel Wilson) and Betsy (Anna Camp) maneuvering their way through enemies | Still from the film’s official trailer

There is nothing here that truly lands as necessarily effective on both the action and comedy fronts, and even those in between. The film takes a bit long to get into its main premise, first getting into arbitrary introductions of its thinly-sketched character dynamics and plot conceit, and clumsily trying to build upon them with attempts at an emotional core (emphasis on attempt). 

There’s a certain ‘been there, done that’ underlayer to the level of writing in that first act that extends into the rest. Nothing really keeps the energy up aside from intermittently goofy one-liners from Rebel Wilson’s deadpan turn along with the rest of the supporting cast (Da’Vine Joy Randolph’s snarky performance got some chuckles out of me), and even then the script doesn’t go beyond base-level schtick that could’ve befit their energy. 

As such, when the actual “Die Hard on a wedding” kicks in, there isn’t really anything to find yourselves invested in, in either the potential for ratcheting stakes on levels emotional or physical, or on-point absurd gags skewering the scenario.

For a film that prides itself in action, there is a lack here of truly memorable physical sequences. Simon West has never been one for distinct style, his most notable output being ones that mostly define the era they’re released in (Con Air’s slick, poppy Jerry Bruckheimer-produced pulp in the ‘90s and Lara Croft: Tomb Raider’s mid-2000’s CGI blockbuster video game adaptation), but his directorial work in Bride Hard is an anonymous-feeling one, which may or may not be an indictment on the base-level we’re working on this decade. 

Bland digital cinematography that hangs together with haphazard needle-drops and occasional on-screen text (which even has a spelling typo in the first 5 minutes) is the general visual foundation. There’s some variation in the way the action sequences are shot when it comes to framerate, but the conceptualization does not feel as thrilling as it should be. The construction of the actual high-octane sequences the film has by the third act does not hold up to scrutiny either, with some of the most baffling green screen work in any film I’ve seen this year sinking whatever hope it had to make up for the past hour or so. 

Bride Hard is the type of project with a canvas wide enough that if utilized well, would potentially be an entertaining romp with either hilarious punchlines delivered by a talented cast, a tight over-the-top thriller with exhilarating fights, or a bit of both. Sadly we live in a world where that didn’t materialize, and what we have isn’t much of anything. A total lack of what is colloquially known as sauce, 100 minutes that go by too quickly because nothing registered as worth investing. At least the bloopers at the end were cute.

Bride Hard is now showing in Philippine cinemas through Pioneer Films.

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