Directed by: Yorgos Lanthimos
Written by: Tony McNamara
Starring: Emma Stone, Mark Ruffalo, Willem Dafoe, Ramy Youssef, Christopher Abbott
Rating: [5/5]
As we age and experience life, we build calluses that take the edge off the harsher moments that will inevitably occur. It’s what makes those difficult lessons important to learn as part of life. Poor Things then asks the question of what would happen if someone experiences life, especially as a woman, with the malleable brain of a baby. Something befitting the mind of Yorgos Lanthimos and he manages to craft something magnificently insightful and quite disconcerting much like all of his films.
Seeing a woman attempt to jump off a tall structure to kill herself, Dr. Godwin Baxter (Willem Dafoe) manages to salvage the body. After realizing she’s pregnant, he replaces the brain of the baby with that of the mother and reanimates her to be Bella Baxter, an individual with the body of a woman and the brain of a baby. As Bella encounters life at a rapid pace, she learns about the pleasures and evils of this world.
Quite the film to take in Poor Things seeks to provoke and stimulate through its story of discovery and the corruption of innocence. Many will find themselves repulsed by what transpires in this film and rightfully so given everything that occurs here comes with intention utilizing Bella as a vessel to look at the world around her. Bella unapologetically acts as herself and acquiesces to her whims just as we did through our developmental years, she just happens to have the body of a woman, which attracts those nasty buzzards.
Like with many of Lanthimos’s films, especially those penned by the great Tony McNamara, they have this dry humor to them that allows some dark moments in the narrative to have something to laugh at even if by shock or surprise. We certainly get that in droves in this film as they navigate this touchy subject matter but handle it in such an unabashed manner Lanthimos loves to do. The man has crossed many boundaries before, which makes it no surprise he goes in the directions he does here. With a tricky balance of tone to handle, Lanthimos weaves these different segments together in defining this experience for Bella.
With Bella aging at a rapid pace, we see how she experiences everything we did from early age into adulthood. Except we get several decades to do it, but she gets a fraction of that. From learning how to speak and even walk correctly, she’s starting from scratch mentally but physically has developed fully because of her inherited body. This inevitably shifts into the sexual as she begins to experience pleasure initially with herself and then when others show her the joys of furious jumping. This element, especially with the introduction of Duncan Wedderburn (Mark Ruffalo) will begin the discomfort this film inevitably wants to place upon the audience.
As Bella begins her sexual exploration, Duncan whisks her away as they engage in various sessions of intercourse. Very strange seeing as Bella, once again, has the body of a woman, but the mind of a child. Where exactly her brain has reached development by the time she has sex with Wedderburn can be debated, but the point of this does not fall into the specifics of her development, but rather these men found her attractive with them knowing of her child-like brain. It allows them to live their ultimate dream where they get to enjoy the body of a fully-formed woman while not having to deal with everything else that comes with a woman who matches that age. Like trading in a younger model but even less of the work and this disgust continues to compound but Duncan Wedderburn remains the main culprit.
While sex dominates much of the conversation around this film, it only plays as part of Bella’s journey as she learns about how to trust in others and the rules of society. These moments make for the funniest in the film. She gets herself in this entanglement with Wedderburn and she does not comprehend the idea of monogamy so when she randomly engages in sexual activities with others, the man gets angry at her in the whiniest way. When they are out at dinner and she eats something she does not particularly like and spits it out. Wedderburn then informs her it’s not proper to do that, but Bella rightfully retorts that she should not have to eat something she does not like nor should she deign to fake enjoyment of it. Bella’s innocence reaches across all aspects of life and this rapid experience of life and operating in this world as a woman makes for quite the learning curve for her. It taps into the central beauty of the film as Bella begins to understand what makes her happy and moves beyond the simple pleasures of life and onto the intellectually stimulating.
Emma Stone for years now has continually proven herself as a one-of-a-kind star, who has such a vast amount of talent at her disposal, especially when it comes to comedy. She has loved collaborating with Yorgos Lanthimos and it has produced impeccable dividends with this film and The Favourite thus far. With her portrayal of Bella Baxter she delivers not only the comedy of this situation through the screenplay but also the physical demands in displaying the clunkiness at first and then all of the sex scenes that the role called for. She proved game for all aspects of this character and she helps craft such a spellbinding character in Bella where we care for her and this life journey she’s experiencing. She gets wonderful supporting performances but Mark Ruffalo as Duncan Wedderburn truly takes the cake. Such a disgusting but incredibly hilarious man in his whininess and lack of shame. Ruffalo devours this role and left no crumbs with each line delivering the laughs.
A complete and utter feast of a film, Poor Things brings together so many talented collaborators into one uncomfortable, hilarious and insightful look into a woman experiencing life under the most obscure circumstances. It brings together this fully realized journey for Bella displays what expectations get laid out to women and how acting out against it makes her look strange. Many will resonate with Bella making her an unforgettable character and one Emma Stone will forever deserve mountains of praise for bringing to life in the perfect way she does. Lanthimos does his thing once again in bringing together the supremely strange with something that undoubtedly makes you think all within a production design that allows for this all to take place in a world that resembles ours but also does not. This film exhibits once again what a dynamic Lanthimos can build when working with Emma Stone and Tony McNamara.
Films with Josh 
