Poor Things

Fuck you Anatomy of a Fall!! This duel of two European films that have collected awards and received similar enthusiastic ovations is won by Poor Things on all fronts. It can hardly compare to that ungrateful, extremely long and uninteresting, disgustingly cheap and literal copycat The Staircase for jaded bookworms and art nerds of the deepest grain. Poor Things is exceptional in that it satisfies both regular viewers and critics, which happens rarely. Yorgos Lanthimos creates unconventional and interesting films (I liked The Lobster and The Killing of a Sacred Deer), so I went to the cinema prepared, but this guy has matured as a director to the point where he has possibly made the best film of the year right from the start. I have never seen or remember such flawless filmmaking that would excel and dominate in every aspect. Poor Things is formally amazing. A beautiful Steampunk world in the Victorian era with beautifully painted sets (there are some scenes that you will probably want to hang as a painting at home), it has an original idea and a lot of interesting concepts (those animal hybrids are perfect). It also has a very strong cast. Willem Dafoe as the scientist is very smart and impressive, Mark Ruffalo has possibly the best role in his career, and Emma Stone, well, she is absolutely awesome, a sort of a cross between Harley Quinn, an absolutely incredible acting performance, if not the best female performance I have ever seen, she plays Bella brilliantly, I would be surprised if she didn't end up on drugs or in a mental institution after this. As a bonus, there is plenty of dark and cynical humor, where the whole cinema laughed. The humor always managed to liven up the film properly, and Bella's vulgarity and rudeness in society were simply the best. The film won me over almost from the beginning (although at first, I was afraid they were going to show us a black and white version), but once Bella starts traveling the world, it's one big party, with an excellent screenplay, great actors, fantastic cinematography, amazing visuals, humor, dialogues, and it's also appropriately perverse and twisted, as they fuck like crazy here! (The episode in the Parisian brothel with all those creeps and perverts is an absolute gem). I applaud standing up, I cry with enthusiasm, I take off my hat. A masterpiece. Flawless and magnificent! Proper Frankenstein's daughter! :) 10/10. (01/13/2024)

…and Edward Scissorhands found the love of his life in Bella… The intellectual Yorgos Lanthimos in the fantastical world of Tim Burton with a considerable portion of sex, the socially hot topic of emancipation and framing in an artistic form for the highest film awards. Distinctive humor spiked with a bizarre parable about growing up and awareness of the feminine self. A delightful black-and-white paraphrase of Frankenstein with a brilliant depiction of the instinctive behavior of a curious childlike mind in an adult body with its physical needs. The aptly depicted process of the downfall of male rationality and ego after falling in love with a sexually animalistic and mentally unstable woman. Poor Things has the sole of a European arthouse delicacy that all Hollywood actors long four. I may or may not give it a fifth star in due time. A lot of scenes struck me as overly strained and not as funny as most of the guffawing audience found them to be. [Sitges Film Festival] (10/15/2023)

Poor Things is a tremendously charming and wildly playful cinematic bildungsroman that demolishes gender roles and patriarchal fallacies with unbridled childlike verve, while grandiosely revealing their absurdity. Whereas Barbie was built on a shared sisterly sigh with a smile and remained in the realm of consumerist conformity while glorifying plastic kitsch, Poor Things offers up a lavish and iconoclastic riot grrrl pamphlet with a likable pout. Bella Baxter is a captivating, monstrous role model. Her journey through the world inevitably leads to her coming of age, but not in the sense of abandoning immediacy and committing herself to accepting the lot in life that others have laid out for her. Bella gets to know the world with its painful paradoxes, but she does not let herself be constrained by those around her and can conversely build places of personal freedom within herself and in her immediate surroundings amid all of the social nonsense. The film incorporates all of this into a sort of Art Nouveau ornament that is simultaneously delightfully beautiful and unavoidably bittersweet, as the steampunk stylisation and grotesque derangement constantly highlight its fantastical and thus unrealistic essence. (02/19/2024)

The Daughter of Frankenstein and her emancipatory odyssey across Europe and the Mediterranean. Once again, Yorgos Lanthimos presents us with a fragment from a twisted fantasy world, but one that bears more parallels to our own than one might first expect. The story focuses on the development of the character Bella, who is brought back to life after death by a peculiar scientist, whereupon, with the brain of a child, she learns about the world and gradually develops in all directions, even those that could be described as taboo. Emma Stone gives a masterful performance, and her character packs on more and more layers as the minutes pass until the triumphant finale. This engaging, visually extravagant and humorous film about the journey of an original protagonists of real-world discovery and gradual emancipation will definitely not bore you for a moment. (10/12/2023)

Karel Zeman for the 21st century, or the emancipation of the Bride of Frankenstein through an original "porn satire" that manages to cut to the quick again and again; sometimes literally. Emma Stone gives such a masterful performance that if I were her husband, I wouldn't be doubly sure if she doesn't top it at home as well. (01/25/2024)