Poor Things
Overview
Poor Things is a 2023 surrealist black comedy fantasy film directed by Yorgos Lanthimos, based on the 1992 novel by Alasdair Gray. The film stars Emma Stone as Bella Baxter, a young woman in Victorian-era London who is brought back to life by an unorthodox scientist. The film opens with Dr. Godwin Baxter (Willem Dafoe), a brilliant but disfigured surgeon, finding the body of a pregnant woman who has committed suicide. He takes the brain of her unborn baby and transplants it into the mother's skull, creating a new person — Bella. Bella is an adult woman with the mind of a child, learning to walk, talk, and understand the world. Her development is accelerated, and she becomes curious, impulsive, and sexually uninhibited. Dr. Baxter, whom she calls "God," is her loving but strange father figure. He is engaged to marry Bella to his student, Max McCandles (Ramy Youssef), a kind and patient young man. But Bella is seduced by Duncan Wedderburn (Mark Ruffalo), a flamboyant, narcissistic lawyer who takes her on a grand tour of Europe. The film becomes a picaresque journey as Bella discovers sex, philosophy, poverty, and the cruelty of the world. She works in a Parisian brothel, where she experiences sex in all its forms and concludes that it is a transaction like any other. She encounters violence and death, and she learns that the world is not the beautiful place she imagined. The film is visually stunning, with Lanthimos using fish-eye lenses, vibrant colors, and fantastical production design to create a world that feels both familiar and alien. Emma Stone delivers a fearless, physically demanding performance, learning to walk and talk as Bella evolves. She won the Academy Award for Best Actress. Mark Ruffalo is hilarious as the preening, pathetic Duncan. Willem Dafoe is touching as the lonely, damaged God. The film explores themes of autonomy, sexuality, and the nature of humanity. Poor Things was a critical and commercial success, earning over $117 million worldwide. It won four Academy Awards: Best Actress for Emma Stone, Best Costume Design, Best Production Design, and Best Makeup and Hairstyling. The film is a bizarre, beautiful, and deeply feminist fairy tale.
