Emma Stone and Yorgos Lanthimos are quickly becoming one of Hollywood’s most exciting duos. The pair has already teamed up on two excellent movies, with Poor Things and The Favourite, and now it’s completing its collaborative trio with Kinds of Kindness. The movie’s first trailer was released on Wednesday, and it already looks like a fascinating change of pace from the duo’s previous work.
The book Poor Things is based on is even stranger than the film
08.03.2024 - 18:11 / polygon.com / Willem Dafoe
Poor Things is a pretty odd movie. The film, now available to stream on Hulu, and up for 11 Oscars, fits the expectations for a project from Yorgos Lanthimos, the absurdist director of such curiosities as The Lobster and The Favourite. But the movie isn’t half as odd as the 1992 novel it’s based on, by eccentric Scottish writer and artist Alasdair Gray.
Lanthimos read the book and decided to adapt it as far back as 2010. “Immediately when I read the novel, I felt like I haven’t read anything like it, and especially, I was drawn to the character of Bella Baxter,” Lanthimos told Polygon in an interview in late 2023. “I just found her a fascinating character and someone that could definitely carry a film.”
Lanthimos met Gray at the time and was impressed by his energy and enthusiasm. (Gray was then in his 70s; he died in 2019.) The author dragged Lanthimos on a speed-walking tour of his native Glasgow, “showing [him] the necropolis, the cemetery, the university, parks, things around his neighborhood, and just talking about the novel and the characters,” Lanthimos recalled. Gray said he had seen Lanthimos’ film Dogtooth and thought it was great, and gave the Poor Things adaptation his blessing.
The movie Lanthimos eventually made is pretty faithful to Gray’s book. The story follows the same lines, and the extraordinary concept — a reclusive Victorian surgeon brings a dead woman back to life by transplanting the brain of her unborn child into her adult body — is straight from the book. That character, Bella Baxter (Emma Stone), is just as startling, spirited, and lovable in the movie as she is on the page. The film echoes many of the book’s themes — free will, sexual liberation, escape from social norms — and screenwriter Tony McNamara finds a tone that is not so far from Gray’s in its mix of mordant humor and warmth, silliness, and seriousness.
But even though Poor Things the movie may seem like a lot, Poor Things the novel is even more. Lanthimos and McNamara made some big changes in their adaptation. Here are some of the ways the book is different.
Like most of Gray’s books, Poor Things is deeply Scottish. Although Bella goes on a globe-trotting adventure, the book opens and closes in Glasgow, where her creator, Godwin “God” Baxter, lives, eventually with his assistant, Archibald McCandless. Scottish identity, history, and politics are important themes in the book. Lanthimos jettisoned all this by moving the action to a hazily imagined London, although Godwin remains Scottish in Willem Dafoe’s portrayal.
The movie’s phantasmagorical art deco world is quite different from the world of the book, too. With its strange vehicles, architecture, and modes of dress, it feels quite disconnected from our
The website gametalkz.com is an aggregator of news from open sources. The source is indicated at the beginning and at the end of the announcement. You can send a complaint on the news if you find it unreliable.
Top Authors
Popular Topics
droidgamers.com
25.03.2024 / 17:13
Howl, the Dark Folktale Turn-Based Strategy Game, Released on Mobile
Earlier this year, a slick, visually arresting turn-based strategy game called Howl arrived on PC and consoles to general critical acclaim.
gamesradar.com
25.03.2024 / 15:49
Dragon Age creator says that if crunch is "the only way" to make massive games, "maybe the industry deserves to die"
David Gaider, the creator of Dragon Age's setting, has spoken out against the current state of the games industry, and the "fear" developers have of needing to crunch to make enormous games as if it's the only way forward. He believes that "it doesn't have to be that way," but that if it did, "maybe the industry deserves to die."
gamesradar.com
21.03.2024 / 21:09
With just one day until release, Dragon's Dogma 2 has a new release trailer - and things are looking bigger than ever
Dragon's Dogma 2 will be out in mere hours, and to celebrate the impending release, Capcom have revealed a new launch trailer as part of the Future Games Show, teasing some of the fantasy perils waiting for us on the other side.
digitaltrends.com
21.03.2024 / 16:07
Where to find the bookseller in Stardew Valley
Books are not completely new to Stardew Valley. Prior to the 1.6 update, you could find lost books that gave some background details about Pelican Town but didn’t give you any in-game benefit. Now, there is a new collection of books that grant your character some nice buffs or abilities. You can find a few of these new books hidden in the world, like the new Powdermelon seeds, but there are some exclusive ones you need to buy from a new bookseller NPC. Despite not making any business sense, they are only open for brief windows of time in a specific place. Here’s when and where to find the bookseller.
gamesradar.com
20.03.2024 / 15:39
Former Bond Pierce Brosnan is back in the spy game after joining new thriller from the director of Ocean's Eleven
Former James Bond actor Pierce Brosnan has signed himself up for more spy business, having joined the cast of Steven Soderbergh's upcoming thriller Black Bag. He's not the only returning to the world of espionage, either, as Naomie Harris, who previously played Eve Moneypenny in Daniel Craig's batch of 007 movies, has also been added to the new flick's starry line-up.
rockpapershotgun.com
19.03.2024 / 11:51
Sand Land, the upcoming action-RPG based on Akira Toriyama's manga, has a demo out now
If you're keen to try out Sand Land, an upcoming action RPG from the developers of One Piece Odyssey and the creator of Dragon Ball, Akira Toriyama, then I have some great news. There's a demo out right now that lets you explore a portion of the sandy map, try out a handful of the characters, and ride some rusty vehicles ahead of its release next month on April 25th.
screenrant.com
14.03.2024 / 11:45
Your DualSense Controller Just Got Even Better Thanks To New PS5 Update
PlayStation has released the new 24.02-09.00.00 update for its DualSense and DualSense Edge controllers to make for a far better overall gaming experience. The aim of the PS5's DualSense controller has been to better immerse players with haptic feedback and dynamic adaptive triggers that respond to the types of weapons being used in-game, such as the drawing of a bowstring or pulling a pistol's trigger.
gamesradar.com
13.03.2024 / 17:38
Even in the 90s, Nintendo was trying to shut down the console wars: "We ought to appreciate what PlayStation has achieved"
The console wars are a tale as old as time—or at least as old as the point when games consoles from multiple companies came onto the market. Whether Sega claimed to do what Nintendon't or actual customers determined to justify why their console of choice was objectively the best, this war continues to rage on to this day. However, even as far back as the 90s, it wasn't an ideology that Nintendo wanted to promote.
gamesradar.com
13.03.2024 / 17:37
GTA 6 could be the most important thing "to ever release in the industry, so no pressure," reliable analyst predicts
It's still months before we can even hope to have GTA 6 in our hands, but there's no doubt that it's one of, if not the most anticipated game on the horizon. However, its launch doesn't just have a lot riding on it because of its eager fanbase, as one games industry analyst predicts that "there's probably never been a more important thing to ever release in the industry."
polygon.com
12.03.2024 / 20:05
The Taste of Things and other movies where food has never looked better
Part of the magic of cinema is how, in spite of only engaging two of our senses, it can evoke all of them. Food makes this abundantly clear: Cinematic stories about cooking and eating can bring about sensory bliss, bringing us home with a few shots and sounds of a beloved dish, or somewhere entirely new with the same.
gamesradar.com
10.03.2024 / 22:05
Miyamoto confirms new Super Mario Movie from Illumination coming in 2026, but instead of a sequel, the film is "broadening Mario's world"
Following the billion-dollar success of the first Super Mario Bros. Movie, series owner Nintendo and animation studio Illumination have announced another film "based on the world of Super Mario Bros."