Flesh It Out: You Haven’t Seen Poor Things? You Poor Thing!

It’s weird, but stick with it, he tells me…………. I’ve heard that before!

Hey Fleshbot fans! Occasionally, I do watch a movie that’s got some spicy bits, naked people, and a fair amount of sex, but you can still see it in a regular movie theater. Imagine that! I had actually not heard of this film, Poor Things, until one of my Weird Movie Boyfriends (I have two, and when they get to discussing film together, it’s wild) fairly insisted that I go see it with him, describing it in brief as a feminist riff on Frankenstein. Out we went to the theater and I found it to be a compelling tale with an amazing cast. Be warned that my ramblings that follow about the movie are pretty spoiler-heavy.

The film is set in Victorian London. We watch a young pregnant woman called Victoria Blessington (Emma Stone) jump off a bridge and kill herself because, well, her life kinda sucked. Not content to let the poor girl rest, disfigured mad scientist Godwin Baxter (Willem Dafoe) resurrects her by swapping out her brain with the brain of her fetus which was still living, and thus our protagonist Bella Baxter is born. Now if you’re going “Hey that’s gross, this asshole is making a DIY sex doll for himself with a kid’s brain. Fuck him!” --- just hold on a minute! That’s where I was, too, reader. Godwin is a father figure for her and of the men in the film, in my opinion, treats her the best, ya know, after he like, reanimated her non-consensually and all, so the bar is really low here.

As Bella’s mind expands, she meets people other than her “creator” who she calls “God” for short and begins to learn about the world. Her brain is growing and maturing so her speech improves and hey, once she discovers jilling off, she's like, hey, that's fun! Also, she has an incredibly wacky fashion sense and just a lust for life. Bella, to me, an autistic person, seemed coded as an autistic character at times, but not in the shitty autism-minstrel-show way (lookin’ at you, Big Bang Theory). She ain't neurotypical, that's for damn sure. Emma Stone is fucking phenomenal.

In the course of things, “God” takes on an assistant, a medical student called Max (Ramy Youssef), who has taken a liking to Bella and really wants her, still pretty childlike and biddable at this point, to be his wife so this being Victorian times, two dudes make a deal and boom you’re engaged. He's back later, but he was the Boring One. Girls in movies never pick The Boring One. Bella then meets a slimy yet charming grifter called Duncan (Mark Ruffalo), who she decides to run away with because she needed autonomy from “God” and at this point, is not so excited about the impending nuptials. Well, Duncan is a dick once it’s clear that Bella can’t be controlled easily anymore and then they’re broke so Bella has to ply her trade, but does so of her own volition while Duncan, a useless manchild, loses his shit.

I really enjoyed the positive portrayal of sex work as a way for Bella to make her own way in the world on her own terms and the fact that throughout the story, Bella refuses to accept that sex is in any way shameful and sees it as a source of pleasure and humor like it’s meant to be, and then realizes she can do it for a living? How cool is that? Also, she befriends Madame Swiney (Kathryn Hunter) and a pretty solid crew of fellow working girls and learns about socialism too. Once Bella is really grooving on the hoe life, sadly, the shit really hits the fan. I’m not spoiling it any further!

Poor Things is adapted from a novel by Alasdair Gray, which I plan to read, and the film was directed by Greek filmmaker Yorgos Lanthimos. It just picked up the Golden Globe for Best Picture (Musical/Comedy) and Emma Stone rightfully snagged Best Actress, so clearly some people agree with me that this isn’t a movie to miss, even if it is disturbing at some points.

A meme I saw described Poor Things as “Barbie for people who listen to Björk”. They aren’t wrong. I confess to really not knowing much about Björk, but Bella’s mannerisms and quirkiness definitely put her in that category for me and there is some weird music in this film. Also if you love costume drama and weird dreamy surreal things and Gothic horror vibes and are a sucker for a good use of a fisheye lens, you’re going to dig it. A bit of wine and/or edibles are recommended as pre-movie snacks for maximum weirdness.