Poor Things (new Yorgos Lanthimos film)

[El Unicornio, mang]

It's an interesting poser to say the absolute least. If you got the brain of a baby and put it in the head of a 32 year old woman and then went on a sex holiday constantly banging this unholy union of baby and grown woman, would that make you a heinous paedophile that should be imprisoned immediately? 

Legally and morally, yes. The argument "but they look like an adult" holds no water and is the same argument that rock stars and such would use to legitimize sleeping with underage girls. And the opposite would not be a crime (as awful as it would appear). But societally I think people are more uncomfortable with how something looks.

So I get that this film could be a comment on that, but also feel like if the lead character wasn't played by an adult it would be a lot less accepted.

[idunnosomename]

You cant shag a woman with a baby's brain!!

Well you're shagging a baby with a woman's brain!

That's not a baby with a woman's brain it's MICHAEL. BLOODY. WINNER!!!

[checkoutgirl]

It's the spider baby. It's got the body of a spider but the mind of a baby.

Yeah but should you be shagging a spider?

I told you, it's got the mind of a baby!

That probably makes it worse to be honest.

It's academic anyway because she works in a brothel in Paris now and wants nothing to do with me. Apparently her sexual liberation and financial independence is more important. But I can't move on. I never thought a spider would be able to capture my heart but here we are.

[checkoutgirl]

Was there a Streetcar reference in this? Surely a desperate man standing in the street screaming "BELLA!!!" as loud as he can is a nod to that?

[Cleveland Steamer]

Wasn't it more like a desperate man standing in the street screaming "CUNT!" as loud as he can?

[Oosp]

Emma Stone won the Best Actress Oscar last night for this, a film about which I started this fascinating thread. Did she thank me? Not yet. Only a matter of time

[Mister Six]

This is basically what I thought about the film. It's not about paedophilia so much as men wanting a woman with no critical thinking abilities or personality. Every man in this film is a piece of shit who wants to own/fuck/control Bella. God is probably the worst, presenting himself as a loving father figure when really his intent was to make a mindless sex doll but because he can't physically fuck her he hires a drippy proxy to do it for him but then Bella is "stolen" from them. Ruffalos character goes mad not because of love but because he cAnt break Bella, he can't use her the way he uses other women. Bellas husband literally doesn't seem to care that she's had her mind wiped, only that he's got his "property" back and he's willing to kill her rather than let her go again.

I feel the film is deliberately uncomfortable, I've not read the book so can only take my opinions from the film, what god has done to Bella is supremely fucked up

All of this is so obviously true to me that I'm not sure how there's any debate over it. I've seen people saying how Bella in the film represents the male fantasy of having access to a mentally immature, sexually active teenager, but do any of the men in the film look like they're having a good time with her?

[Dr Rock]

Was there a Streetcar reference in this? Surely a desperate man standing in the street screaming "BELLA!!!" as loud as he can is a nod to that?

Definitely. Hilarious.

[C_Larence]

I don't know if showing us that she was a horrible person beforec jumping off the bridge so don't know what that's meant to say to us, because isn't she basically no better off than the goat husband or the chicken dogs, with the added hell that as she develops she'll understand more that she's a revived brain living in her dead mothers body.

I don't think it's as clear cut as that, considering the indented "fuck fuck fuck fuck" writing she finds, and the fact that she threw herself off a bridge

[Noodle Lizard]

Doesn't really answer the moral question of whether or not it's okay to have sex with a baby with the mind of a 48-year-old barrister.

[AllisonSays]

All of this is so obviously true to me that I'm not sure how there's any debate over it. I've seen people saying how Bella in the film represents the male fantasy of having access to a mentally immature, sexually active teenager, but do any of the men in the film look like they're having a good time with her?

Well Ruffalo's character does until he doesn't, right? I think it's more ambivalent than you're making it sound here.

[popcorn]

Well Ruffalo's character does until he doesn't, right? I think it's more ambivalent than you're making it sound here.

He exploits her but it goes badly for him in the end. She outgrows him fast.

[Mister Six]

Yeah, his "good time" lasts a couple of weeks at most.

[Oosp]

A baby what shits improves itself

[Dr Rock]

His inability to control her literally brings him to his knees.

[AllisonSays]

I also think the film God is played cuddly and avuncular, unlike in the book.

[dissolute ocelot]

I thought it suffered from none of the characters being exactly sympathetic (Bella was sometimes) and nothing being in the slightest bit real. I definitely found it less emotionally engaging than The Favourite, The Lobster, or Dogtooth, and less interesting intellectually than The Lobster (which actually was subversive in what it had to say about romantic love). I'm maybe too delicate for some of the humour, a lot of the brothel stuff just seemed horrible. On the other hand, vastly better than Sacred Deer which really was entirely unsympathetic and unpleasant and also kind of drab.

I'm not taking seriously the women writing angry thinkpieces about it being insufficiently feminist, because what do you expect? Her to spend 3 hours attending political meetings and establishing some kind of women's social union that campaigns successfully for improved housing standards in London/Alexandria? At the same time, it does definitely feel like a film made by men, from a book written by a man whose books are very man-centric (1982 Janine is entirely aware of that). So any feminist message is (as mentioned above) incredibly obvious. But still better than most Hollywood films (Hi, Barbie, mate!).

Ruffalo's performance seemed weirdly pantomime compared to Dafoe's. Ruffalo has been vastly better in a bunch of other films: You Can Count On Me (probably still his highlight), Margaret, The Kids Are All Right, Spotlight, Foxcatcher, etc; he excels at being flawed yet charming neither of which really worked here. There was maybe a more general problem with clashing acting styles here: I actually quite liked Jerrod Carmichael's total failure to act, but maybe that was in comparison to some of the scenery-chewing.

Ending:

Spoiler alert

As to why they didn't transplant God's brain, I guess one obvious explanation would be that they didn't know how. God did OK with Bella but the other woman was notably less successful, and Max was a much less good surgeon. Possibly God had brain cancer as well, or was otherwise too far gone. I read something that said that the brain had to be younger or smaller like a baby's or a goat's, but I don't recall that being mentioned (maybe it was though).

And it makes sense thematically for God to be dead and Bella to go out in the world, so really they couldn't let him live. But it could have explained it better.

[close]

[neveragain]

I also think the film God is played cuddly and avuncular, unlike in the book.

Didn't find that myself. He was a grouchy old fuck, maybe lessened on screen by his protégé and Bella kowtowing to him a lot of the time.

[kalowski]

In 5 years time we'll look back to see we've overrated this.
Stone was excellent, as was Daefoe but Rufffalo was wooden - accent all over the place.
It didn't feel like a feminist movie to me, more like a man's ideal dream of a feminist movie.
At times it looked beautiful, and was wonderfully quirky, but it was bang average.
I'd watched X-Men (2000) just before. Now that was great.

[checkoutgirl]

There's an ad for this on posters for Disney. They've started and acquired other brands to make adult oriented stuff without associating it directly with Disney.

Now there's an ad with Poor Things and Disney+ right beside each other. I wonder can kids select it on Disney+ easily. That might be annoying for parents.

[Dr Rock]

but Rufffalo was wooden - accent all over the place.

He was hilarious.

[Inspector Norse]

I watched this the other day and thought it was alright. I liked that it had a lot going on with plenty of shades of grey, which is quite unusual for a Hollywood film. I'm not sure whether I would regard it as striving to be a specifically "feminist" film, I thought it was just looking more generally at social conventions and morals, although with the way men treat women as a central part of that.
The plot and dialogue rattled along well. Stone was good, Dafoe was good, Ruffalo was very funny but that was partly because he seemed so confused about how to play some scenes.
On the negative side, the child's-eye-view production design was revolting and the unnecessarily mannered direction grew tiresome after a while. It felt like the film was undermining itself by being so arch and fake, and at least when Wes Anderson does that it at least looks pretty.

[Armin Meiwes]

I found this quite boring, it created quite an unusual imaginative world but didn't do a lot with it and everything the central character does is just incredibly repetitive.

[samadriel]

I was quite bored as well, I stopped watching after the cruise, feeling I had better things to do but intending to finish the movie the next day, and I just couldn't get back to it. Hopefully sometime this week I'll find the motivation.

[Cuntbeaks]

Watched this last night and lost interest in the first 10 mins.

I couldn't believe in the character of Bella at all, I could only see Emma Stone "acting". It was very tiresome.

[checkoutgirl]

Watched this last night and lost interest in the first 10 mins.

Check out Frankenhooker (1990). It's the same basic story but quicker

[druss]

Watched this last night and lost interest in the first 10 mins.

I couldn't believe in the character of Bella at all, I could only see Emma Stone "acting". It was very tiresome.

Also saw this a few days ago and was a bit stunned that she won an Oscar for this. In the opening minutes I wondered whether the tropic thunder adage might be proven wrong but she obviously progressed a little as the film went on.

Maybe I'm becoming a prude but I found the sex quite gratuitous and don't think the story would have lost anything if it had been toned down a bit.

Ruffalo and Dafoe were the highlights for me, both very funny in different ways.

[Waking Life]

It's interesting that the feedback from those who saw this in a cinema is a lot more positive than those watching at home. Not that it's massively cinematic as such, but I always wonder if the 'transfixed engagement' of a cinema strengthens the appreciation of certain types of films (e.g. it's a lot easier to switch something off than walk out of a cinema). I do think I'll enjoy it less watching it on Disney, so haven't felt much of an urge.

Or its just that those watching in the cinema were more interested in the first instance, so more likely to give a positive view.

Or the hype has died down and a backlash has gained momentum.

Or it's half past midnight and I'm talking shite.

[greenman]

I'm guessing perhaps a difference in who's watching it?

[MojoJojo]

Now there's an ad with Poor Things and Disney+ right beside each other. I wonder can kids select it on Disney+ easily. That might be annoying for parents.

There's loads of adult content on Disney+, and it has the same age control settings as all the streaming services.