I first became aware of Yorgos Lanthimos with his 2018 Academy Award winner, The Favourite. Despite loving Olivia Colman’s performance in the film, I really struggle with it and couldn’t get into it properly. Lanthimos’ unconventional and artistic presentation was what largely put me off. But strangely enough that’s what I found most attractive about Poor Things when I saw trailers and screenshots. It just looked so bizarre that I couldn’t not see it. So, I’ve given Lanthimos another chance to win my heart, and he most certainly did that with Poor Things.
Following her suicide, Bella Baxter (Emma Stone) has her brain replaced with that of an unborn foetus’. Cared for by her creator, the skilled surgeon Godwin ‘God’ Baxter (Willem Dafoe), Bella learns how to behave in polite society, whilst Godwin’s assistant, Max McCandles (Ramy Youssef) falls in love with the woman she is becoming. However, Bella runs away with lawyer Duncan Wedderburn (Mark Ruffalo) and travels across Europe on a journey of sexual self-discovery and pursuit of knowledge, much to the disdain of all the men she comes into contact with.
Following her suicide, Bella Baxter (Emma Stone) has her brain replaced with that of an unborn foetus’. Cared for by her creator, the skilled surgeon Godwin ‘God’ Baxter (Willem Dafoe), Bella learns how to behave in polite society, whilst Godwin’s assistant, Max McCandles (Ramy Youssef) falls in love with the woman she is becoming. However, Bella runs away with lawyer Duncan Wedderburn (Mark Ruffalo) and travels across Europe on a journey of sexual self-discovery and pursuit of knowledge, much to the disdain of all the men she comes into contact with.
I loved the story. Based on the 1992 novel of the same name by Alasdair Gray, the film draws heavily from Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. If Bella were not so beautiful, she would be some horror movie monster, a twisted creation of a mad scientist with a God complex (quite literally given his name). But despite the obvious parallels with Shelley’s novel, Poor Things flips the concept on its head in unexpected and original ways. Whilst it uses common tropes of stories like Frankenstein, it never feels like a cliche.
The subject matter can certainly be difficult to contend with. The film is highly sexually charged, with a lot of explicit sex scenes that can be strange to come to terms with given Bella’s underdeveloped mental state. In fact, there were one or two walkouts during my screening of the film. However, I feel that the film balances this troubling subject matter so well with a combination of humour and cleverly presenting the entire film through Bella’s perspective.
The exaggerated art style can be owed to Bella seeing the world through curious new eyes, and Lanthimos uses this to as great effect as he possibly can. The film does utilise extensive green screening, and whilst the CG effects can look a bit ropey at times it actually kind of works considering how fantastical the world design is. I’m still not a fan of Lanthimos’ extensive use of fisheye lenses, but he definitely gives the film this otherworldly and childlike feel through the visuals.
The subject matter can certainly be difficult to contend with. The film is highly sexually charged, with a lot of explicit sex scenes that can be strange to come to terms with given Bella’s underdeveloped mental state. In fact, there were one or two walkouts during my screening of the film. However, I feel that the film balances this troubling subject matter so well with a combination of humour and cleverly presenting the entire film through Bella’s perspective.
The exaggerated art style can be owed to Bella seeing the world through curious new eyes, and Lanthimos uses this to as great effect as he possibly can. The film does utilise extensive green screening, and whilst the CG effects can look a bit ropey at times it actually kind of works considering how fantastical the world design is. I’m still not a fan of Lanthimos’ extensive use of fisheye lenses, but he definitely gives the film this otherworldly and childlike feel through the visuals.
The film is just straight up hilarious too. Ruffalo in particular had me cackling on the regular (apologies to everyone else in the screening other than the one other lady who was having as great a time as I was, I’m sure we were very annoying). His egotistical yet utterly pathetic performance is one of the best roles I’ve ever seen him in.
But he can’t hold a candle to Stone who delivers a marvel of a lead performance.
Consistently, on a scene-by-scene basis, Stone’s physical and vocal performance develops from a literal baby with no motor skills and communicating exclusively in gargled grunts, all the way through to the intellectual and well-mannered woman Bella ends the film as. Every single time that there has been any progression of time, Stone’s performance reflects that with Bella having greater control and awareness of her body or expanding her language skills. It’s tough enough for actors to deliver convincing story arcs for characters, but to have to have your character go through the entirety of childhood development in the body of an adult is something I’ve never seen before, and it was fantastic.
I’m sure this will be a more divisive film than The Favourite because of its more peculiar subject matter, but where I couldn’t stand that film, I absolutely adore Poor Things. I still have some issues with Lanthimos’ filmmaking techniques, but they’re greatly overshadowed here by the narrative, writing, and performances from Stone and Ruffalo. I laughed so hard I cried, and I loved that it was just so bizarre. I must go watch this at the cinema again, and this is absolutely a film I’m going to be recommending people check out when they’re in the mood for something a little different.
But he can’t hold a candle to Stone who delivers a marvel of a lead performance.
Consistently, on a scene-by-scene basis, Stone’s physical and vocal performance develops from a literal baby with no motor skills and communicating exclusively in gargled grunts, all the way through to the intellectual and well-mannered woman Bella ends the film as. Every single time that there has been any progression of time, Stone’s performance reflects that with Bella having greater control and awareness of her body or expanding her language skills. It’s tough enough for actors to deliver convincing story arcs for characters, but to have to have your character go through the entirety of childhood development in the body of an adult is something I’ve never seen before, and it was fantastic.
I’m sure this will be a more divisive film than The Favourite because of its more peculiar subject matter, but where I couldn’t stand that film, I absolutely adore Poor Things. I still have some issues with Lanthimos’ filmmaking techniques, but they’re greatly overshadowed here by the narrative, writing, and performances from Stone and Ruffalo. I laughed so hard I cried, and I loved that it was just so bizarre. I must go watch this at the cinema again, and this is absolutely a film I’m going to be recommending people check out when they’re in the mood for something a little different.