Poor Things is a 2023 political, fantasy film directed by Yorgos Lanthimos which tells the story of Bella Baxter, a girl who is created by a wacky scientist with the brain of a child in the body of a full-grown woman and goes on a journey to discover how she will live her life. The film stars Emma Stone in the leading role along with Mark Ruffalo, Willem Dafoe, Ramy Youssef, Christopher Abbott, and Jerrod Carmichael.
Underneath the weird and whimsical world of quasi-steampunk aesthetics and discordant melodies, Poor Things is a shallow and superficial attempt to portray the political ideology of “sex-positive feminism” as a heroic and rationale position.
It must be acknowledged that the set design and costuming for the film are in large part responsible for it not becoming dull throughout the 142-minute runtime. Clearly, the artists behind these elements of the film had a specific otherworldly feel they were trying to capture and it pays dividends in the finished work. Poor Things is filled with gorgeous shots filled with vibrant pastel colors which bring to life the key locations of the film. The sets and costuming bring the viewer into a new world which is certainly not normal and bring a surrealist aspect to the movie. The costuming perfectly melds with this atmosphere through the use of flamboyant, avant-garde dresses and more traditional upper-class fashion. Another aspect of filmmaking that works in service of immersing the audience in the world of the movie is the music, which uses instruments in a minimalistic style, incorporates strange and semi-dissonant harmonies which accentuate the stories zaniness. (An example of this would be “Bella” from the soundtrack).
The acting in Poor Things is also selectively excellent with Emma Watson giving a captivating performance (though it is not as impressive as it has been lauded as being) and Mark Ruffalo having some flashes of comedic brilliance. In the lead role, Emma Watson is forced to capture a wide range of emotions as she develops from essentially infancy into mature adulthood. However, as will be discussed at length later on, the script fails her in this department so that her performance never feels like that of a real human developing and growing. Nevertheless, the uncanniness and full commitment to the role is what makes the viewer unable to look away whenever Watson is on screen. Mark Ruffalo suffers from accent fluctuations which make some of his dialogue distracting, but when he is good in the film, he is very good and quite funny at times. Willem Dafoe is also in the film but his performance did not stand out as being memorably excellent or terrible, merely passably good. There was one performance which was highlighted by its jarring quality was that of Jerrod Carmichael. For some reason, whether through the fault of the director or the actor, every line of Carmichael’s character came across as though the actor was reading the lines for the first time, in a painfully overpronounced voice off a sheet of paper. The character gets only a short amount of screentime but it sticks in the viewers head because of how much it breaks the viewer out of the cohesive immersion that everyone else is working so hard to maintain.
Though the acting and visuals of Poor Things are worthy of praise, the story and the politics underlying it are an enormous mess. This is unfortunate because the story and message is the most important part of a film and for a movie like Poor Things, it ends up being all fluff and no substance, so to speak. This is exemplified by the seemingly random and casual use of the fisheye camera, for no discernable reason other than because it looks aesthetically artsy and different. This leads to the movie looking drastically better and more deeply conceived than it realistically is. As far as the story goes, Poor Things does an unconvincing job at best of following through on its premise. If, as we are led to believe, Emma Watson has the brain of an infant at the start of the movie and eventually mentally matures through childhood to adulthood, then the director and screenwriter have done a terrible job at showing this development. This is due to the fact that Watson’s Bella Baxter behaves much less like a human child, and much more like a computer. It seems that Lanthimos believes that in the absence of traditional socialization, a child will develop to be non-judgmental, without prejudice, and purely rational. However, the opposite is true. Children (and humans in general) are usually far more likely to be prejudiced and overly emotional and have to be taught against these tendencies by their civilizing influences. There was only one occasion where Watson’s Bella Baxter behaved like a child and was overcome by her emotions rather than acting in a cold and rational manner. Because of the way Bella was written, it is almost impossible to see her as human, much less feel a strong human bond to her because she feels so alien. Additionally, and this is much less important, Watson’s Bella Baxter is repeatedly described by the male characters of the film as being extraordinarily beautiful, yet it seems the makeup and hairstylists have gone out of their way to make her appear uglier and more unnatural. The reason for this is unclear.
Finally, the movie fails on its political messaging, both because it fails to honestly or meaningfully tackle its themes, and because the vision it presents is not the utopian future that most people would like. Whether the viewer agrees with or disagrees with Lanthimos’ opinions on “sex-positive” feminism, it is clear that the skewed world and story that he has created do not meaningfully argue for his political ideas. Bella Baxter, who is made out to the “sex-positive” feminist icon, does nothing wrong in the film (which is not a problem in and of itself), but she is offered absolutely no honest resistance. The film is unwilling to even engage in the debate of the philosophical ideas it brings up. Instead, the characters are either fully benevolent and in agreement with Lanthimos’ ideology, or else they are corrupt through and through and condemnable by all except the most despised fringes of society. For example, there is no defending of Mark Ruffalo’s character when he effeminately protests Bella’s work as a prostitute, because he himself is a hedonist and is mad at Bella only because he has no control over her. Imagine instead if there was a male character in Bella’s life who believed that she should adhere to a stricter sexual ethic, not because he wanted to control her, but because he held himself to that standard and believed in its benefits. Lanthimos sidesteps all debate in favor of a bland and boring story which has little to no conflict and only remains interesting due to the fantastical visuals, music, and actors, doing their best with a lackluster script. Furthermore, while emotionless and uncaring philosophy of Bella might appeal to the Hollywood elite, the vast majority of moviegoer will feel detached and somewhat disheartened by what is put on screen in front of them. The triumphant indulgent feeling Lanthimos clearly believes the final scene of the movie should hold is more likely to be replaced by pity from the audience who will see Bella as an abused victim by a mad scientist and a society which encourages her to lead a life of emotional detachment and withdrawal from all responsibility.