Poor Things (2023) * 1/2

Directed by:  Yorgos Lanthimos

Starring:  Emma Stone, Willem Dafoe, Ramy Youssef, Mark Ruffalo, Jerrod Carmichael

The last teaming of Emma Stone and writer/director Yorgos Lanthimos was the lackluster The Favourite (2018), which earned Olivia Colman a Best Actress Oscar.  In 2023, we have Poor Things, which aspires to be lackluster.  This is an odd duck with rich performances at the service of a movie in love with its oddness.  The style overshadows everything else and the story may be one you've seen before.  And then the movie really takes a wrong turn.  

Stone plays Bella Baxter, a woman who committed suicide reanimated by Dr. Godwin Baxter (Dafoe), a disfigured, but kindly Dr. Frankenstein-type who put a child's brain into Bella's adult body.  It takes time for Bella to develop motor skills, language, and social graces, but once she does she is taken to Lisbon by caddish suitor Duncan Wedderbern (Ruffalo) in the name of adventure.   Once Bella's sexuality awakens, she is insatiable to the point that even Duncan tells her he needs a rest.   Their journey takes them to Alexandria, then Paris, then back to London where Bella's true identity is discovered.   Bella not only discovers sex, but prostitutes herself in a sordid, extended sequence which grows depressing, and then finds herself wanting to become a doctor like her father figure "God" Baxter.  

Poor Things is not hard to follow, but we find ourselves wondering why we would want to follow it.  It's a Frankenstein knockoff with a female creature instead of a male one.  I've frequently stated I'd watch Emma Stone in anything.   Poor Things puts that belief to the extreme test, even though I occasionally found Bella likable mostly because Stone is able to find the humanity in her.   Ruffalo is having a ball as the proper Duncan who finds Bella is more than he bargained for.   But, I found my attention drifting as the cast speaks strange dialogue in front of obvious movie sets.  

I'm not sure what the title Poor Things is referring to:  The characters or the audience being subjected to it.