2023 was a ripe year for cinema\u2014one need only look at the truly all-consuming cultural event that was Barbenheimmer to see that. Both films offered two entirely different experiences that somehow shared much of the same existential heart and seemed slated to be the contenders for best film of the year. But just as the year came to its close, along came an offering that has turned heads\u2014and opinions\u2014with its truly unique experience: Poor Things.<\/p>\n
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Poor Things, directed by Yorgos Lanthimos (The Lobster, The Killing of a Sacred Deer) and both produced by and starring Emma Stone, is an absolutely electric affair of joy, loss, sex, and introspection. Its story\u2014whose screenplay was written by Tony McNamara based on the novel of the same name by Alasdair Gray\u2014is an exploration within the framework of Frankenstein. We follow the creation Bella Baxter (Emma Stone), a woman reanimated by Godwin \u201cGod\u201d Baxter (Willem Dafoe) after a suicide attempt. As Bella\u2019s mind grows rapidly, so too does her interest in the world\u2019s offerings. Across her globe-trotting journey her mind becomes sharper and her experiences more broad, but all still centre around growing questions of humanity, love, purpose, mortality, and sexuality.<\/p>\n
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Willem Dafoe in POOR THINGS. Photo by Yorgos Lanthimos. Courtesy of Searchlight Pictures. \u00a9 2023 Searchlight Pictures All Rights Reserved.<\/p>\n
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What is most thematically striking first in Poor Things is the bluntness of its sexual content. A key component from the start, it is handled in a manner that is all at once erotic, mundane, absurd, and humorous. With a recurrent theme of womanhood and parenthood, it is a logical concept to recur, but it is rare to see it handled in such an evocative manner without existing for cheap thrills. Bella navigates the entire spectrum of understanding one\u2019s own sexual being from (metaphorical) inception through to a point of contemplation few allow themselves, using the pitifully wretched playboy of Duncan Wedderburn (Mark Ruffalo) and a rotating door of individuals as a mirror to knowing herself.<\/p>\n
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Equal in surprise and delight is the film\u2019s use of a fantastical history and anachronistic elements. It is subtly and slowly revealed that this is not the Victorian age with minor technological wonders sequestered to the Doctor we come to expect of our Frankenstein stories; steampunk-like inventions soon emerge\u2014a motorized carriage with horse figurehead, city-wide gondola systems, fantastical luxury cruisers\u2014that paint an uncanny world just different enough from history to captivate with great ease.<\/p>\n
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Emma Stone and Mark Ruffalo in POOR THINGS. Photo by Atsushi Nishijima. Courtesy of Searchlight Pictures. \u00a9 2023 Searchlight Pictures All Rights Reserved.<\/p>\n
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These seemingly out-of-place surprises are truly the magical blood flowing through Poor Things and are by no means contained only to visual world-building elements. In the script and many of the actors\u2019 performances there are modern turns of phrase\u2014most notably Wedderburn\u2019s near-constant swears and cries of frustration\u2014that pull one deeper into each conversation. Stone and Ruffalo wield these modern flares with ease and intrigue, and the film\u2019s setting and events cater beautifully to them, a furious, impassioned, and timeless ballroom dance scene exemplifying this tactic.<\/p>\n
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There are aspects of these surprise stylized elements that at times can jar further than feels necessary. Godwin burps up massive, floating bubbles of self-inserted bodily fluids. The horizon is a lurid collection of contrived colours. Bella\u2019s outfits often resemble flamboyant anime costumes brought to life in the wrong genre. Yet each of these elements works so splendidly in the context of this twisting reimagining of a classic tale that it is hard to find fault in their use. It is the journey of an innocent into a strange new world, and Lanthimos has found myriad ways to make it feel as such and to remind us just how odd, frightening, and beautiful our world can be to new eyes.<\/p>\n
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Courtesy of Searchlight Pictures.<\/p>\n
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Poor Things is not a revolutionary film. It is not doing something entirely unheard of within the forum it presents itself. It is not changing how we will do and view film from now on. But despite that, it feels so entirely new, a spectral breath of fresh air that sits somewhere between the spectacle of modern blockbusters and the claustrophobic indies. One can\u2019t help but feel a similar adoration and appreciation to the sleeper hit of Everything Everywhere All at Once\u2014we are being given the gift of profound and absurd existential entertainment in our cinema, and it is a gift most enthusiastically accepted.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
2023 was a ripe year for cinema\u2014one need only look at the truly all-consuming cultural event that was Barbenheimmer to see that. Both films offered two entirely different experiences that somehow shared much of the same existential heart and seemed slated to be the contenders for best film of the year. But just as the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_vp_format_video_url":"","_vp_image_focal_point":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-28703","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-call-for-artists"],"yoast_head":"\n