POOR THINGS

"I must go punch that baby." - Bella Baxter

Anointed as a classical tale of creation and despair, Frankenstein bears witness to the cruelty of humanity and the consequences of curiosity. Lacing the dark story with warnings of human capability and fear of the unknown establishes the horror narrative with more than just the bone chilling novelty of monstrous recreation, but the world’s inability to accept its otherness. Yorgos Lanthimos shapes his new film Poor Things around this concept of human resurrection. Rather than harp on the world’s deficiencies, Lanthimos focuses on reality through the eyes of holistic curiosity. Add an oddly endearing journey of self discovery to the humorous, and sometimes devastating, renewal of life and you get one of the most entertaining and humanizing cinematic experiences of the year.       

Truth be told, Mary Shelley and Lanthimos would probably enjoy each other’s company considering the director’s affinity towards experimentation and stoically dry humor throughout his filmography. His fascination with the unconventional makes his films unique as bizarre human interactions and quirky mannerisms pepper traditional settings. The quick, clipped sass and unemotional line delivery are a trademark of his, but Poor Things seems to stray from this status quo. Arguably the most loud and vibrant, while also sacrificing none of the expected peculiarity, the film delves into Lanthimos’ most regarded topic: human connection. A woman brought into the world breaks free from her shackled life and the men who hold the keys to stumble aimlessly on her path of enlightenment. Her expedition’s beauty is found in her awkward personal growth and defiance of societal norms. But the real je ne sais quoi exists in the acknowledged dichotomy between a dazzling hunger for life and a crippling heaviness of its shortcomings. 

Bella Baxter was raised in a loving Victorian London townhouse surrounded by pets and experiments. Never mind that the dog has a goose head and the chicken has a cat head, or that the experiments are on cadavers she begs to play with and then stabs repeatedly. Her creator watches over her with analytic care as she chaotically stumbles about the house screaming incoherently and smashing everything. Her father/creator, whom she unironically refers to as God, beholds the countenance of monstrous scars but the sturdy presence of a calming overseer. He never yells at her outbursts and rash nonverbal explosions and permits her creative freedom to stiffly dance and gleefully ride a bike. Being a young, beautiful woman with an infant’s brain, after the good ole switch-an-adult’s-brain-with-a-baby’s operation, her childlike tendencies and endearing strangeness bring all the boys to the yard. Max McCandles (Ramy Youssef), a warm and notably sane medical student turned assistant, observes Bella’s quick growth and politely asks her father for her hand in marriage. But Max is no match for the rapidly developing autonomous Bella Baxter, especially for the tenaciously puffed up lawyer Duncan Wedderburn (Mark Ruffalo) whose very name screams likable buffoon. The latter whisks her away on a world tour serving as an odyssey for human connection and understanding, but mostly a lot of sexual intercourse and public debauchery. 

Bella’s penchant for ignoring social cues and underdeveloped communication style paired with Duncan’s haughty swagger and physical tics generate the comedic duo of any director’s dreams. And while her daily lessons of societal assimilation occur through dining room winking contests, gyrating dance floor routines, and spitting terrible food out at the dinner table, her biggest and most impressionable piece of education is in the bedroom. The interest in sex in this film is staggering, but also rightfully so. An act Bella refers to as “furious jumping” becomes a narrative focal point and driving desire during her initial courtship with Duncan. Her sex drive provides comedic irony in its encapsulation of body autonomy and hedonism. Lanthimos refuses to shy away from this unspoken coming of age ceremony because taboo household topics like sex don't rid the amount of space it holds in adolescent minds. 

In typical male fashion, Duncan starts to fear Bella’s oncoming independence and kidnaps her onto a cruise ship and unwittingly into the arms of philosophy. After meeting two friends on the ship who vocalize differing opinions and offer books about ideology and ethics, Bella finds herself ruminating on the essence of life and less on when Duncan will be ready for her to jump on him again. Because of his male ego’s inability to cope with her self-governance he literally throws two of her books overboard, drowns his sorrows in the casino, and hilariously attempts to kill one of her friends in a fit of sloppy, drunken rage. A stop in the town of Alexandria, however, introduces a tonal shift in the film as Bella witnesses poverty and famine for the first time. Unable to cope with what she sees, she breaks down in tears and demands that the towns people be helped, going so far as to round up all of Duncan’s earnings and give it to a deckhand to deliver to the suffering community. Gone is that girlish deviance and that flare of obstinance, gone is that uncensored frivolity and giddy desire for exploration, and in its place is knowledge and self-awareness, a woman, an adult, who finally absorbs the realities of the world.  

The set design steps right out of a Salvador Dali painting aiding as a living, breathing addition to the futuristic, postmodernism atmosphere. Colorful architecture and gaudy accent pieces matched with an unplaceable technological time period provide the perfect stimulating playground. Bella’s wardrobe mirrors her own desire of expression, prancing around in vibrant colors and avant-garde dresses accentuating her creativity and eye for fashion. However, all of these impressions of self seem to shift with Bella’s changing exposure to the harsh realities of life, as if the woman herself controls the elements around her: curvaceous luxury turns to squared minimalism, technicolor sunsets and vibrant hues turn to snow covered grays, exciting fashion statements turn to simple black dresses and braided hair. The film progresses as one unit, a verifiable extension of her, translating the emotions and feelings of the human experience not only through dialogue but also visually tangible mediums. 

Having spread her wings in the Lanthimos universe previously with The Favourite, Emma Stone holds nothing back as the precociously enchanting Bella Baxter. Having understood the importance of commitment, Stone throws her entire body and soul into imbuing Bella with an eccentric affability. Perfect renditions of physical comedy in her “youth” start with awkward, gangly arm movements and clunky footwork. Clipped, off-kilter grammar lime her verbiage during broad smiled happiness and brow-bunched confusion. This combative, uneducated woman commands the screen as little by little she absorbs her surroundings and refinement finds its way into her limbs and onto her tongue. Exposure to human plight aids in her metamorphosis while she expands her vocabulary and sheds her physical rigidity. An enlightened woman emerges with enviable posture, a stoic expression, and a newfound way with words. And regardless of the transformation, Stone ensures Bella’s essence, her unapologetic opinions and outspoken nature, remain. Leave it to Emma Stone to entirely enrapt us in this woman’s journey. Because by the end, even though you miss the brazen tantrums and unchecked laughing fits, you want to cry for the woman she has become, proudly smiling to yourself as if you were a parent witnessing your own child’s growth. You don’t even realize how invested you are in her progress until you’re fully wrapped in it, and that might just get Miss Stone her second Oscar.

Poor Things exists from calculated creative freedom in a land of experimentation. Fish-eye lenses give a sense of scientific voyeurism as we observe Bella’s human experience. Lanthimos embeds ludicrous comedy with scientific modernism to showcase the voyage of human actualization and autonomy. Bella Baxter is a woman of indulgence and common interest, and amongst the surrealism and unconventional backsplashes she finds herself in a daunting world of creation, censorship, and benevolence.