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I’m sure I’ve heard about the movie Poor Things (2023) before. I guess I just wasn’t paying attention to how vile the plot was. I hadn’t given it a thought at all until I read the Bounding Into Comics article OPINION: Hollywood’s War On Men Is A War On Their Audience.

Poor Things…

is a 2023 science fantasy black comedy film directed by Yorgos Lanthimos and written by Tony McNamara. It is based on the 1992 novel by Alasdair Gray. The film stars Emma Stone, Mark Ruffalo, Willem Dafoe, Ramy Youssef, Christopher Abbott, and Jerrod Carmichael.

According to Wikipedia (I know, I know), the plot goes…

In Victorian London, medical student Max McCandles becomes an assistant to disfigured surgeon Godwin Baxter and his maid Mrs. Prim. He meets and falls in love with Godwin’s ward, a childlike young woman named Bella. Godwin reveals that the woman, who was pregnant, committed suicide by leaping off a bridge. He resurrected Bella by replacing her brain with that of the still-living baby, resulting in her having an infant’s mind. Max is intrigued by Bella’s child-like demeanor, and, with Godwin’s permission, asks for her hand in marriage. Bella accepts, but as her…

Hold on. Wait a minute. I SAID STOP!

So, in yet another of an endless list of Frankenstein remakes, the brain of a newborn infant is PLACED INSIDE THE BODY OF A THIRTY YEAR OLD WOMAN?

Sorry for the “yelling,” but regardless of the intension of the screenwriter and the director (Tony McNamara and Yorgos Lanthimos respectively) that is insane.

Setting aside the medical difficulties involved (the baby’s brain being much smaller than the interior of a woman’s skull), what the hell have you just done?

I don’t care if the body is that of an adult, the baby’s brain is just the baby’s brain. Being placed in a woman’s body will not make it grow faster and certainly will not allow the infant’s intelligence to accelerate even one small bit more than it would have otherwise. In fact, an infant coming to awareness inside an adult body would be torturous for the poor child. That’s a really sadistic thing to do.

When it says “having an infant’s mind” you can’t therefore continue with “Max is intrigued by Bella’s child-like demeanor, and, with Godwin’s permission, asks for her hand in marriage. Bella accepts…”

She’s a baby. She doesn’t know from anything. It’s a totally unreasonable fantasy to expect Bella (Emma Stone) to understand what marriage to Max (Ramy Youssef) is, accept a marriage proposal (have and enjoy sex on the wedding night), have her intelligence rapidly develop, crave freedom the way an older child, teen, or adult might, and then, have frequent sex with Duncan (Mark Ruffalo)… Do you see my point?

Okay, I haven’t seen the movie. I haven’t even seen the trailers. But as crazy as it sounds, this movie has been nominated for and won oodles of awards. On IMBb, it has a rating of 8.5 out of 10. Rotten Tomatoes (which is becoming increasingly rotten) gives it a tomatometer of 93% and an Audience Score of 82%.

Most, but not all of Bella’s experiences have to do with sex including serving as a hooker in a Paris brothel (one of the prostitutes teaches Bella about Socialism which I guess is supposed to be a good thing). Yada, yada, yada, Alfie (Christopher Abbott) has his brain swapped for that of a goat (no, I’m not kidding), The End.

At various points, we hear people are “intrigued by Bella’s child-like demeanor” and “attracted to Bella’s ‘adorable way of speaking’ and her child-like naivete…’. Kiddie porn anyone? What a perfect movie to consider while there’s so much buzz in news and social media about “Epstein’s Client List.”

An adult woman with the mind, not just of a child, but of an infant, that’s the object of multiple sexual romps with the “woman” seemingly unconcerned about what is happening to her and what all these adults are doing to her.

Legally, is Bella age thirty, or a week old?

Although the movie is set in Victorian London, given modern morals and laws, how do we consider teens and woman who suffer from Down’s Syndrome or who are Developmentally Delayed or Disabled being sexually exploited? Just because she has an adult’s body, is it okay for adult men and women to have sex with her? She herself has no idea what it all means having only a baby’s understanding of anything, and she certainly can’t consent. What’s up, #MeToo generation?

Did the director, the screenplay writer, and all the actors lose their collective minds when they thought this movie was a good idea? What was the audience thinking?

This movie is supposed to be all about feminism and female-empowerment, and even though I haven’t seen it, the plot reads more like human trafficking of minors for the purpose of sexual exploitation and prostitution. How is that empowering?

While most of the reviews are overwhelmingly positive, a few did understand the reality of what was really being sold.

Mick LaSalle at the San Francisco Chronicle called the film “a 141-minute mistake” and asserted, “Worst of all, it’s dishonest. It purports to be a feminist document, but it defines a woman’s autonomy as the ability to be exploited and not care. … What version of feminism are these guys — Lanthimos and screenwriter Tony McNamara — trying to sell us here?” Film critic Scott Mantz applauded LaSalle’s post, finding the film “a seriously misguided take on female empowerment”, though he praised the film’s ambition and production values.

Maybe if/when I see this film (I’m sure not paying even a dime to see it), I’ll change my mind, but it’s hard to see the positives in this plot. What was the point of throwing this woman/infant to the proverbial sex wolves? Was it some sort of experiment in “I’m an infant who identifies as a sexually charged women who thinks screwing for hedonistic pleasure is somehow liberating?”

Maybe I don’t understand the 21st century and forcing adult experiences upon an immature and infantile mind is somehow a good, progressive, and DEI thing.