Poor Things

For every award season, there is often one film that particularly stands out as being bizarre and out-of-place. Whether this sentiment comes from a subjective viewpoint, or that the film itself is just odd and quite different from the line-up that one would expect from the usual strictly safe and familiar-friendly Academy favorites, it’s become a bit more common to see the uncommon in the list of the best films of the year. For 2023, that movie is Poor Things. Directed by Yorgos Lanthimos, starring Emma Stone, and based on a novel written by Scottish writer, Alasdair Gray, this trippy film about a woman being Frankenstein-ed back to life and the resulting journey she goes on to evolve herself both mentally and even sexually, caught the attention of cinephiles and is already tracking hard for nominations, yet the general census from audience members has been strongly split down the middle between those that love it with a passion, and those that hate it with a passion. Both are correct in some shape or form. In a fantastical version of Victorian London, a disfigured surgeon named Godwin Baxter (played by Willem Dafoe) is approached by obsessive medical student, Max McCandles (played by Ramy Youseff) who credits his practices, and in return, Godwin introduces Max to his latest experiment, a childlike woman named Bella (played by Emma Stone). With the body of a grown woman, but with the mind of an infant (in a much more literal sense due to physically resurrecting a suicidal woman’s corpse with the brain of her unborn child), Bella is kept inside away from on-lookers, but she soon gets attention from people like Max and even lawyer, Duncan Wedderburn (played by Mark Ruffalo), who wishes to take her on a trip of debaucheries that would allow her the freedom of choice that she isn’t receiving from her controlling father-figure (even though he himself only wishes to have her for himself). Having just discovered the pleasure of sex, she agrees to leave, but starts to discover more of the dangers and vulnerabilities of the world and people as her mind continues to grow. Learning from her experiences and becoming more ‘’human’’ throughout her travels, Bella may return to her old home a changed woman and learn how many people took advantage of her when she was nothing but a mindless doll. Poor Things feels like a barbie doll that was drowned in tar, tossed in the trash with pages of philosophy coating her body, and was forced to listen to an X-rated movie for hours on end. There are so many things wrong about this film from a scripting, directing and even visual level, ruining many of what could be complex and fascinating aspects of this plot and reducing them down to such a derogatory, mindless, and pointlessly vulgar experience.

The original novel for the story clearly got inspiration from the iconic Mary Shelly novel, Frankenstein, but the dabbles in fantastical reality, inclusion of sexual exploration and a crude sense of humor helped it stand out as more than just a gender-swapped copy, and there actually is a ton of material for this premise to work with. While the allusion might be apparent, simply switching the genders on the Frankenstein story opens up a treasure trove of new areas to explore. Discussions about gender norms, societal expectations, the importance or even relevance of mindfulness and following an expected route, and the obsession with purity and how it’s an aspect of a person that people will either infantilize and protect, or exploit and want to destroy, it’s all juicy stuff and would’ve provided a movie that could’ve been mindful and even to some extent, political, but could counteract that with a surreal atmosphere, quirky characters and a distinct sense of humor. However, that’s not what’s provided in the movie despite all the components being there and even obviously displayed, because the manner in which this film is executed not only feels disastrously simplistic and lacking, but it arguably borders on offensive and distasteful. It might think it’s being deep and portraying this story in a unique manner, but none of the various tricks, visual cues and over-the-top performances distract from the overt sexual content and disturbing levels of comfort that it has with displaying them without any rhyme or reason. Yorgos Lanthimos as a director has always had a strange sexual element infused into his movies, but despite usually picking creative ideas that are abstract but still meaningful when looked at from a different angle, his style and need to force in graphic depictions of sex and violence often overshadows any insightful and mature aspects these stories could deliver. While the plot outline for the film is actually pretty good and even the structure has a loose, but still effective three-act-structure that still feels like an episodic book, the script by Tony McNamara (who worked with Lanthimos and Stone previously on The Favourite) just doesn’t do this source material any favors. The dialogue is childishly loud and irritatingly crude, the pace of the film goes too slow and methodical to be interesting, yet the sporadic nature of the acting and the editing by Yorgos Mavropsaridis prevents any moment of respite, and instead of approaching the film in a manner like Stanley Kubrick or David Lynch (two directors who are also fairly controversial for their depictions of certain topics) where they balance their graphic content with an abstract contemplative atmosphere, this film’s exposition-heavy, zero-subtly delivery leaves no room for interpretation.

Each of these leading actors have been in good stuff previously and considering the amount of Award buzz people like Stone, Ruffalo and Dafoe are getting, they are clearly doing something that appeals to that specific demographic, yet it’s hard to pinpoint what that exactly is for this picture. Whether it’s a favoritism kind of situation or ironically just a consequence of being talented, each of these three play these parts in a perfectly serviceable manner (despite the horrible dialogue and direction), but it’s really nothing that we haven’t already seen from them in the past. Emma Stone is a great actress and she’s proven to be able to play dramatic and comedic roles in a very natural yet still impressive manner, and this role of a developing woman coming into her own through a very weird (and openly crude) manner feels like something she could pull off without even trying, but the character just isn’t written with that much depth. The film seems more interested in watching her do sexual things in a child-like manner (which is just all kinds of wrong on so many levels) and most of her dialogue just feels like traditional feminist jargon that’s been spelt out several times before in a much more respectful and impactful way (it’s ironic Barbie came out the same year as this because they tell essentially the same message in a night and day fashion). Honestly, the best moments in the movie are when there’s no dialogue and the moment can just speak for itself. You’ll get much more from watching Bella awkwardly dance for the first time, experiencing the beauty and horror of life while walking the streets of Lisbon, taking in what she was like as a person in her past life from an openly horrific man who used to be her husband, and even the first act of ‘’pleasuring herself’’, than anytime she talks about wanting to ‘’furiously jump’’ on any man she sees, it just doesn’t really work as well as it could have. Stone at least has the benefit of some level of thought put into her role, as most of the others have next to nothing. Dafoe’s surgeon is just Frankenstein except with weird perverted traits (because of course, he has them), Ramy Youseff is so weak-willed and detractive to the story that he doesn’t stand out, Mark Ruffalo’s role is so pathetically cartoonish that its honestly just embarrassing, Christopher Abbott as the husband of Bella’s former life just feels like a tool to push forward the message in the most obvious of manners, and while actors like Kathryn Hunter, Jerrod Carmichael, Hanna Schygulla, Vicki Pepperdine, Suzy Bemba and even a criminally underused Margaret Qualley are fine from a performance standpoint, their roles aren’t anything worth remembering.

The look of the film is definitely interesting, capturing a semi-futuristic look at a bygone era but through the lens of a dark fairy tale with a steampunk iconography. It’s not explored far enough to really feel like a unique design (rather just set dressing for the movie to exist within), but it is one of the few elements of the film that isn’t overdone and is just allowed to be visually pleasing and creative without feeling the need to insert something needlessly crude or mindlessly graphic into it, and it’s very appreciated in that regard. Both the production design by Shona Heath and James Price, and the costume design by Holly Waddington, is well done and does a nice enough job emulating the feel of the Victorian era, but never forgetting that it’s a disturbed take on said time period, so its allowed to go a little weird and wild with the look, but even from a visual standpoint, certain artistic tropes get in the way of what on their own, are good qualities for the film to have. The cinematography by Robbie Ryan at times helps provide an otherworldly and off-kilter mood to the environment, but there are plenty of moments where the camera includes an odd addition just for the sake of oddness and not for purposeful reasons. There are several scenes portrayed in a fish-eye camera viewpoint, there’s a lot of wide angle lens usage, there’s time when the background will be blurred against the person in focus, the film switches from black and white to color without much rhyme or reason, and while the room is there to explain these creative decision in a way that makes sense in the context of the movie, it doesn’t feel like there was an actual explanation outside of just wanting to be weird and artsy. The music is in the same camp, with an actual composition from Jerskin Fendrix that is instrumentally effective and has a sound that feels aristocratic and fancy, but with a hint of unprincipled, broken twinge that adds a messy element that makes it sound wonderfully imperfect. In spite of the piece being alright on its own, it doesn’t really register in the right moments when it’s used in the film and its limited melodic variety prevents any moment from truly being memorable from a musical perspective.

Poor Things being so heavily divided in terms of how people view it is a testament to the tolerance that some people are willing to have for an obvious hard-R film that pretends to have an arthouse vibe when really, it’s just in name alone. There are plenty of films that have been able to mix a balance of grotesque and intelligence to create something very unique and meaningful, and this film is not that and is instead a hollow, bad-taste, glossy picture that confuses edgy controversial sayings and sentences for risky, avant-garde storytelling. The direction is actively damaging and even a little too far in places, the acting isn’t bad, but isn’t unique enough to work through the negatives, the script has good concepts, but flounders them in execution, and the visuals and aesthetics of the film are unique and have merit but are handled in a very poor manner. This is definitely a movie that one needs to see for themselves to determine whether they will either love it or hate it (with both being entirely possible) but be forewarned for anyone willing to dive into this cesspool of debauchery and lewdness, there is little shelter from all of these poor things.