To think that Poor Things is actually a seriously fucked up film?

[AngeloMysterioso]

Spoilers obvs

Basic plot summary- pregnant woman trapped in an abusive marriage attempts suicide by jumping from a bridge. Frankenstein-type scientist retrieves her body, transplants the unborn baby’s brain into her head and brings her back to life. This child-woman is then basically abducted by a dodgy bloke who teaches her all about the joys of fucking, she very naively gives all their money away and because they are now broke and she enjoys sex so very much, she becomes a prostitute, whilst still having the mental age of a young child.

There’s no denying Emma Stone is brilliant in the role, but AIBU to think that it is otherwise one completely messed up Freudian nightmare of a movie?!

@OoooohSpookyGhost you obviously feel very strongly about this film.

I watched some of it last night and enjoyed what I saw. Emma Stone & Mark Ruffalo are excellent in it. I'm going to watch it all from the beginning tomorrow.

Uh. I just made a general comment about authors.

You obviously feel very strongly about me.

I didn't mean that. I meant because you have posted a lot. Don't be so defensive.

I’m really flattered but you’re just not my type.

I watched it last night. I'm surprised nobody else has mentioned what I found the funniest and most ironic part of the whole film. At the very beginning there is a warning - "Contains scenes of tobacco consumption". For all the gore, profanity, violence, abuse, sex & nudity, they have a trigger warning about cigarettes. Hollywood at its most utterly bonkers.

I thought it was meant to be tongue in cheek

That did actually cross my mind but we live in such a bizarre world I was unable to come to a conclusion. Ether way, whether it was deliberate humour or accidental I thought it was hilarious.

Maybe that’s the whole premise of the film

it’s tongue in cheek

I wish it was possible for the Oscars to have once in a lifetime themed years - so that, for instance, one year only films that were helmed by women were considered for Oscars (director, writer, production design, lead characters and producers); or a year when it was people of colour who were so honoured. We might then be exposed to a lot of talented people we had never heard of before - a bit like with American Fiction where I have never heard of this screenwriter.

I wasn't keen on what I saw as the underlying politics of Poor Things but I think it is great film making. If a great filmmaker like Lanthimos finds it hard to find funding for his projects how much harder is it for unknowns (especially poc and women and those at the intersections). How do they become great if they are not given the opportunity?

I also feel that those demographics should tell their own stories. If I was a man I would not write about a woman's experience of the world (unless I was doing it from the point of view of a male - which is possibly what Lanthimos has done to horrifying effect). Killers of the Flower Moon for example is a great film in the making undone by spoiler alert the screenwriters' need to make Ernest Burkhart into some kind of hero at the end, which is nigh impossible, given that he killed his wife's whole family and tried to kill her. Would a First Nation writer have tried to pull that off?

A lot of mumsnetters don’t wanna see sex on screen full stop so 🤷‍♀️a film like this ain’t gonna be their thing

they should stick to marvel films or Star Wars or whatever

Without giving away any spoilers is the end of the film the same as the ending of the book? I have just finished the book (literally this morning) and I thought I had read somewhere that the ending of the film is different to the book. I can’t see how the plot would ‘work’ if that changed?

I loved the book. I thought it was very clever. There is a fair amount of sex in the book but it doesn’t dominate the story in my opinion? I don’t know how others feel. I don’t know if I should watch the film now or not!

Also, because they don't like it they think it's only men that do.

If I was a man I would not write about a woman's experience of the world (unless I was doing it from the point of view of a male

I think some men are very good at writing women’s experience - Henry James is probably the most famous example.

I don’t think Alasdair Gray is one of them. He uses the premise of the book, which, although slightly childish could have been interesting, merely to explore his sexual fantasies. The director hones the male gaze further and sexually objectifies Bella to a degree she is not in the book.

Bella’s development is simply a male fantasy version of female pleasure and empowerment, a sex doll who likes Kant. The author and director sell a superficial pseudo-feminism - that some fall for and some don’t. Where’s menstruation, pregnancy, STIs, & PTSD? The idea that freedom for women is fucking and their body is their source of power, is one of the oldest myths and closely aligned with the idea that that’s what women are for.

For all the moustache twizzling exploiters in the book, there is no acknowledgement that the writer and director are among them, and that in the past the exploiters always won. The writer at least makes clear that his book is the fantasy of Bella’s “poor fool” of a husband - the director is too busy bamboozling viewers with fake feminism & fucking to admit that.

@Mirabai you said in an older post that it was shit acting. It wasn't.

I loved it for the most part, thought it was funny and quirky and the sets and costumes were a visual feast. I think if you have watched any other Yorgos films you would probably have not been that surprised by the content. I like the humour it in and the idea of the Frankenstein twist.Does it tout itself as a feminist tract or even the opposite? I have never heard the director say so, that would make it much more one dimensional than it is…it has definitely sparked a lot of healthy and interesting debate. I personally hated Barbie, found it banal, and that was supposed to be all about women’s empowerment despite the fact Ken stole the complete show. Ironically. I think this film was refreshingly different, Emma Stone is fabulous in it. I do think there was a little too much gratuitous sex but that was my only criticism.

Yep!

It's not about the sex, it's 'a' man's take on female desire, which is what makes it so contrived, it almost doesn't matter how good Emma Stone is at acting.

I'm looking forward to Back to Black as I think Amy Winehouse captured that messier, imperfect, unconditioned female desire, it is my era and her background is familiar to me but at a broader level of interest, her music has that real female perspective, I just hope the film reflects that.

With Sam Taylor-Johnson at the helm I very much doubt it.

Ruffalo was excruciating, and personally, although clearly the Academy did not agree, I thought Stone was OTT too.

That's disappointing.

I liked Nowhere boy and she is a woman.

A woman who directed fifty shades of grey 😂

Sounds like an interesting dive into how women are seen in society.

Sorry you can't see it that way

Hated 50 shades though, not that I saw it through to the end. I am not sure about the actress in Back to Black, I could tell she wasn't from North London in the trailer, I am not sure if she is a convincing Amy Winehouse but I'm still going to see it.

Yes, I agree with you, I am really talking about the figure of womanhood that Amy Winehouse represented so many not be depicted very well, sadly.