Poor Things is a very gross film on a few levels. These are not the kind of sex scenes or nudity that most people would find titillating; there are live shots of brain surgery; Willem DaFoe is a grotesque-looking man who burps metal.
It's also a beautiful film. It's probably intentionally both as it comes from the mind of visionary Yorgos Lanthimos who can never be blamed for an unoriginality. His previous works have included The Lobster, The Killings of a Sacred Deer, and The Favourite.
In this film, he tells the story of a miserable pregnant woman (Emma Watson) who commits suicide. A mad scientist (Dafoe) discovers her and takes the fetus's brain and inserts it into the dead mother to reawaken her. It's a female spin on the Frankenstein story with a lot more sex and moral ramifications. See, because the newly revived patient is a grown woman with full sexual capacities. As someone who starts out as the ultimate in naivete, she also wins the attention of two men. One is a debonair socialite (Mark Ruffalo) who simply wants to deflower her, while the other is a more gentlemanly admirer (Ramy Yousef) who's strangely entranced by her.
The end result is a journey of self-discovery, whose uniqueness allows the film to explore romantic tropes in the same way that a science fiction film has a looking-glass way of dealing with societal issues.
The film's art direction is a little overly CGI, but most of its vague steam punk aesthetic seems to work in placing it in some timeless chapter of the past. It's also a film that marks Emma Stone's best performance by miles. She's simply transcendent.
It's also a beautiful film. It's probably intentionally both as it comes from the mind of visionary Yorgos Lanthimos who can never be blamed for an unoriginality. His previous works have included The Lobster, The Killings of a Sacred Deer, and The Favourite.
In this film, he tells the story of a miserable pregnant woman (Emma Watson) who commits suicide. A mad scientist (Dafoe) discovers her and takes the fetus's brain and inserts it into the dead mother to reawaken her. It's a female spin on the Frankenstein story with a lot more sex and moral ramifications. See, because the newly revived patient is a grown woman with full sexual capacities. As someone who starts out as the ultimate in naivete, she also wins the attention of two men. One is a debonair socialite (Mark Ruffalo) who simply wants to deflower her, while the other is a more gentlemanly admirer (Ramy Yousef) who's strangely entranced by her.
The end result is a journey of self-discovery, whose uniqueness allows the film to explore romantic tropes in the same way that a science fiction film has a looking-glass way of dealing with societal issues.
The film's art direction is a little overly CGI, but most of its vague steam punk aesthetic seems to work in placing it in some timeless chapter of the past. It's also a film that marks Emma Stone's best performance by miles. She's simply transcendent.