POOR THINGS
UK 2023, Directed by Yorgos Lanthimos With Emma Stone, Mark Ruffalo, Willem Dafoe, Ramy Youssef, Christopher Abbott, Suzy Bemba, Jerrod Carmichael, Kathryn Hunter, Vicki Pepperdine, Margaret Qualley, Hanna Schygulla, Running time 141′
Distribution: Searchlight Pictures, The Walt Disney Company Italy/Searchlight
“The idea of being able to start over as a woman, with this already formed body and seeing everything for the first time, trying to understand the nature of sexuality, power, money, or choices, with the ability to decide to live by your own rules and not society’s rules, seemed fascinating to me.” Emma Stone, in her second collaboration with Yorgos Lanthimos after the 2018 success of The Favourite, talks about what attracted her to the role of Bella Baxter in Poor Creatures! The film is a female retelling of the classic theme of Frankenstein’s creature, based on the novel Poor Things by renowned Scottish author Alasdair Gray. The protagonist, Bella Baxter, is a young woman brought back to life by the brilliant and unorthodox scientist Dr. Godwin Baxter (Willem Dafoe). Curious about the outside world, Bella escapes with Duncan Wedderburn (Mark Ruffalo), a shrewd and dissolute lawyer, on an adventurous journey across continents, free of prejudice.
Greek director, writer and producer Yorgos Lanthimos is a veteran of the Venice Film Festival, as his first appearance on the Lido dates back to 2011 when, shortly before he turned thirty-eight, he won the Osella prize for screenplay with Alps. Lanthimos later presented the short Necktie at the Festival in 2013 and The Favourite in 2018, which earned him Oscar nominations for Best Director and Best Film. In contrast, he has made three appearances at Cannes: in 2009 with Dogtooth, Un Certain Regard prize and Oscar nominee for best foreign film; in 2015 with The Lobster, jury prize and Oscar nominee for screenplay; and in 2017 with The Sacrifice of the Sacred Deer, screenplay prize. On Emma Stone’s performance in Poor Creatures! The director said:
“She’s all instinct in creating this creature, different from anything I’ve ever seen. Sometimes, Emma would say, ‘I don’t know what the hell I’m doing. Is that okay with you?’ Sometimes, I didn’t know either, so we would try different things. Then, when I was editing the film, I would send her these little messages, “I don’t know how you do it. It’s amazing.” It was something magical.”
