Poor Things - Movie Review

Critics Score - 8 of 10

General Audience Score - 8 of 10

Searchlight Pictures is a movie studio that regularly acquires films of a caliber that frequently go the distance in terms of the Oscar race, especially the Best Picture category. For a studio that doesn’t have a massive archive of films to it’s name, it’s ability to select quality films like Best Picture winners and nominees like Slumdog Millionaire, The Shape Of Water, Jojo Rabbit and Black Swan, it’s almost unparalleled in the industry. This year the studio brings us Poor Things, the brand new film from the mind of Yorgos Lanthimos, the man who brought us The Lobster and Killing Of A Sacred Deer. While Lanthimos has been an eclectic filmmaker with unique visions and sometimes downright weird ideas, the filmmaker struck a nerve with the Academy with his previous film, The Favourite. This trend is likely to continue this year as his latest film is wildly funny and stunning to behold, albeit completely bonkers and completely off the rails at moments. The film plays like a dark and twisted version of a Frankenstein monster movie, only with much more sex than a normal monster film, but the set designs, makeup and costumes are all easily headed for Academy Awards nominations. This film has been painstakingly crafted to Lanthimos perfection and while it’s many messages of pro-choice, female empowerment, toxic masculinity and sex work are interesting, they get a bit lost in the shuffle of everything this film is doing. But in the end, both general audiences and critics alike will find this one hell of a rich old time with these Poor Things.

SYNOPSIS - As our tale opens, we see Bella (Emma Stone) from behind, standing on the railing of a bridge, the sky behind her swirling synthetic hues of deep blue, she’s in a spectacularly woven dark blue dress that looks like a costume from one of the rich elite in The Hunger Games. She begins to lean forward and we get an aerial view of her falling down towards the waters below. We then get a title screen informing us that we’re in London, but the scene cuts and changes to black and white. We see Bella wearing a white blouse and knickers, sitting in front of a piano on a bench, with her legs spread apart and perched up on the keys, she begins sporadically smashing the keys and banging away incoherently. We then see Dr. Godwin Baxter (William Defoe) or “God” as Bella calls him for short, observing her playing, but you’re immediately drawn to the lines on his face. The doctor looks like a version of Frankenstein, his face horribly scarred, almost like it was sliced into pieces and then sown back together at some point. Bella and the doctor then sit in a dining room, a myriad of plates decorating the walls, they sit in oversized chairs on either end of the table as Bella continues banging with some metal utensils. We notice that the doctor has some tubes running from his body to a machine, the likes of which we’ve never seen before but we get the impression he’s getting treated for some kind of illness. It’s impossible to go into too much detail of these sets, however, as they’re so extravagantly detailed and gorgeously designed, I could easily spend the rest of the review talking about them. Suffice it to say that the sets, the ships, trams, instruments, costumes and even the buildings and world itself look and feel very vintage yet also futuristic, like we’ve been transported into a Dr. Seuss book.

We then visit with Dr. Baxter as he performs an autopsy of sorts at some kind of college that looks more like an English courtroom. He asks, “Who would like to reconstruct the organs?”, as the youngsters comment on his work, some consider him a demented hack, others an extraordinary surgeon. As the doctor walks down the street back to his home, we get one of the standard fish eye lens tracking shot as a reminder of whose world we’ve entered. Dr. Baxter meets Max (Ramy Youssef), a bearded gentleman that he’s hired to observe Bella, “a very pretty retard” as Max calls her, to keep notes and write down her progress. All the while we hear the off key strumming of a violin or possibly a banjo that’s out of tune, the music and score keeping us a bit off center, as if just the visuals and everything we’re watching wasn’t enough. But as Dr. Baxter explains to Max that Bella is an experiment that he’s monitoring the results from, as the first act draws out, we watch as Bella goes from babbling and smashing dishes for amusement, to the discovery of her own genitals and masturbation, to more advanced speech and language. She’s learning and developing. But when she’s finally barely capable of making some of her own decisions, a handsome and seductive lawyer Duncan (Mark Ruffalo) comes along and convinces Bella to go see the world with him. To quote Dr. Seuss, “Oh, the places you’ll go”, and in this film the wild adventures, fantastical places and quirky characters Bella encounters while coming into her own and gaining autonomy, well, it’s unlike anything you’ve ever seen on the screen before.

Yorgos Lanthimos is a visionary director that’s unique style is easily recognized and he is easily one of the most auteur directors working today. His vision for this film is executed with master strokes, his brilliance in getting it onto film is almost unparalleled considering how wildly imaginative these characters, sets and even the story itself is. A Best Director nomination is almost assuredly coming for his work on this film. This screenplay from Tony McNamara is also top notch, it’s use of humor and zany one liners to punch up a scene is as good as any I’ve seen this year. Also in store are nominations for so many of the crafts. As I’ve went into some detail about already, the gorgeous costumes that embrace a wide color palette of bright yellows and baby blues, as well as the ruffles, ruffles, oh so many ruffles of all shapes and sizes, there’s virtually no way this film won’t win Oscar gold for this level of work. The cinematography is also stunning, the camera angles and fish eye lens shots utilized along with the editing to keep giving us fresh perspectives assisted the pacing of the film, Poor Things flows by with time escaping the room while you watch. When you listen to the original score of the film, the chimes and orchestra music is sometimes ethereal and fantastical, combined with the off note violin plucking previously mentioned, left for a truly memorable listening experience. Emma Stone is a delight as she delivers a simultaneously entertaining but also physical performance. As she evolves from the robotic walking of her baby like state to the intelligent and confident woman we see later on, she really puts on a show. Defoe and Ruffalo are also giving excellent work and although not onscreen nearly as long, as this is the Emma stone show, still leave a solid impression. Finally the production design of this film is utterly incomparable to anything else I’ve ever seen, another element this film showcases that is destined for the Oscar stage. This film is a technical marvel to behold and while it won’t necessarily make my very favorites of the year, the sheer excellence of most of these elements involved certainly make it worth your time.

SUMMARY - With a two hour and twenty minute runtime, you might expect a film like this to drag, but there’s so much happening and so many details on display in every moment of the film that the entertainment value is through the roof. The richness and beauty of these Poor Things won’t leave you feeling Poor when you leave, with it's one of a kind experience that you aren’t likely to experience again until the next Lanthimos film.