Yorgos Lanthimos has potentially the most fun name to say out loud. Go ahead and give it a try. Say it. Saaaaay it. Yorgos Lanthimos! YORGOS LANTHIMOS! No, I don’t care that you’re at work! Just say his name! Fun, right? It sounds almost like something one would say before a toast or during the casting of a magic spell. It would be perfect to scream while running into battle or jumping out of a plane.
YORGOS LANTHIMOOOOOOOS!!!
Anywho, Yorgos Lanthimos has become the go-to auteur for accessible, dark absurdism coupled with audacious cinematic style. At times his films lean on the darker side of things (see: Dogtooth, The Killing of a Sacred Deer), and at other times his style is a bit more playful (see: The Lobster, The Favourite). His latest, Poor Things, an adaptation of the novel of the same name, is the closest we’ve ever seen ol’ Yorgi come to being whimsical. Don’t worry, it’s plenty dark and absurd, but it’s the first time I can think of that the filmmaker has put out something not just lighthearted, but hopeful.
It’s still crazy fucked up, though, so it’s far from a departure in style.
Poor Things is a Frankenstein tale of sorts. In it we find Dr. Godwin Baxter (Willem Dafoe), a horribly disfigured, well-respected man of medicine who isn’t afraid to get his hands dirty. He grew up as the guinea pig for his own equally brilliant father’s experiments, and he sees it as his duty to carry the Baxter legacy into the future. His latest experiment comes in the form of Bella (Emma Stone), a recently deceased woman who, through a mysterious procedure, has been brought back to life by the good doctor. She’s not the same woman she once was, for reasons you’ll come to know in due time, and instead must learn about the world from square one. Her outward appearance is that of a grown woman, but her brain has a bit of catching up to do.
Locked in the expansive Baxter estate and surrounded by surgical mash-ups of animals that would give even the most unscrupulous taxidermist pause, Bella slowly develops language, social conditioning, and soon, goals of her own. But when her ambitions outweigh her means, she takes an opportunity to go on an adventure with the opportunistic, chauvinistic, hedonistic Duncan Wedderburn (Mark Ruffalo). But much to dismay of so many around her, Bella’s state of tabula rasa has her ignorant to the customs of the time, meaning also that she’s ignorant to expectations and bigotries as well. It’s a man’s world, but that’s not going to stop a free spirit like Bella from engaging with the world on her own terms.
Stone is fantastic. She’s an actress who I’ve always enjoyed, but who also seemed to only work within a small range of characters. Even in Lanthimos’ The Favourite, I always felt her performance, while certainly quite good, went beyond the confines of her skill set. Essentially, I’ve frequently found her to be miscast. She has classically felt, to me, like a passable second choice (even in La La Land, a film which netted her a not undeserved leading actress Oscar). With Poor Things I am forced to reassess Stone. He performance here goes well beyond the scope of where I initially had her pegged. As Bella grows from “infancy” into “radical autonomy” it becomes clear how tuned-in a performer Stone can be. Many would turn Bella into a cartoon character or a punchline, but Stone finds strong motivation in the role — a motivation that shifts as Bella develops. Stone is tasked with being, at first, a curiosity, then an audience surrogate, and finally hero of sorts. In each mode she finds the comedy and the drama, with the nature of each mode undergoing a transformation alongside Bella’s advanced mental puberty. It’s an intensely physical performance to boot. Stone can take on the air of a child, a woman, and even an animal with equal aplomb. She digs deep and goes in some surprising directions. I rescind every doubt I’ve ever had about her. She’s GREAT.
As for Mark Ruffalo, and actor who is known for being the best thing in any movie he happens to be in…welp, I dare say his unhinged performance in Poor Things is a career best. I’ve never seen him playing a sniveling, entitled fop before, but he does it with perfection. It’s the type of role that, had it been my first exposure to Ruffalo, would’ve colored my perception of him here in the real world (to compare: after Gladiator I couldn’t stand Joaquin Phoenix on account of him being such a bastard as Commodus that I couldn’t separate actor from character in my stupid stupid brain — Signs helped fix this issue).
Toward the beginning of the film I found myself a bit nervous about the direction. Plenty of fish eye lens is employed alongside jarring zooms. Lanthimos is extremely present, which isn’t always a good thing. My fear was that the aggressive visual style would constantly pull me from the otherwise hypnotic film, and at first, this was indeed my experience. But with time, and with about 30 minutes allowance for the film to establish its own visual energy, these liabilities became huge assets. Initially gaudy choices are proven to be the language of the film, serving the fairy tale nature of it all. That said, this is an actual fairy tale, not a watered down Disney version. People fuck. People die. People suffer horrifying medical interventions. There’s a steam-powered buggy that garishly decorates the front of the cab with the head and torso of a horse.
Shades of Gilliam, Von Trier, and David Lynch (specifically Eraserhead) are present in tone, visual style, and sense of humor. More than a few images will put your jaw on the floor (and plenty will make you feel squeamish — I was reminded a lot of the general scuzziness of Hard to Be a God). The film shifts in and out of color with regularity, highlighting the tremendous work of cinematographer Robbie Ryan, whose work on Slow West, an all-time favorite, is the stuff of film nerd legend (seriously, go watch Slow West ASAP).
The score, by Jerskin Fendrix (another fun name to say out loud — DO IT), is potentially the best of the year. It’s also his only credit. It’s at times bouncy and nauseating, as if you’ve eaten too many shrooms before going to the circus, and at other times playful and melodic. Sunny, even. For a film that bounces between tones and features a lead character who experiences a life’s worth of growing pains over the course of a just a few months (years? I forget the time frame), the music always finds a way to match not just her mental state, but that of the folks blessed (or cursed) enough to have their lives touched by Bella.
The thematic structure is where the film feels most whimsical. Granted, it’ll take another viewing or two to really pin down EVERYTHING that’s going on here, but there’s something nice about the way it speaks toward the virtues of honesty and curiosity. Bella always tells you how she feels, and she’s always willing to go with the flow and see what information she can glean from an experience. It’s an inspiring way to live, and so few of us can do it. All that “wonder” shit has been cooked out of most of us by the fires of life. I’d love a clean slate. And new knees. I’d like some intrepid mad surgeon to give me new knees.
Directed by Yorgos Lanthimos
Written by Tony McNamara, Alasdair Gray
Starring Emma Stone, Mark Ruffalo, Willem Dafoe, Ramy Youssef
Rated R, 141 minutes
