Poor creatures: the creation of women by Emma Stone, in the film with 11 Oscar nominations

Satire inspired by the classic Frankenstein, “Poor Creatures”, the film that premiered yesterday in Brazilian cinemas as one of the Oscar favorites, features Emma Stone in her splendor. As Bella Baxter, a scientific experiment that exceeds its creator’s expectations, the actress embodies a great enigma: what would we, women, be like, free from social pressures and conditioning? For her performance in the film, she received her fourth Oscar nomination as best actress.

Allegorical, extravagant, the epic directed by director Yorgos Lanthimos is one of the season’s favorites, competing in 11 Oscar categories. It already won the Golden Lion at the Venice festival, last September, when the Greek filmmaker candidly answered the question about what, after all, the main message of the film would be:

“We only create conditions for the characters to reveal conflicts in human behavior,” he stated, “and through the fable, through fantasy, we reveal some absurdities in our real behavior.”

The film was based on the book “Poor Things”, by Alasdair Gray, released in 1992. It was an old project by Lanthimos, fervently embraced by Emma Stone, who is also competing for an Oscar as the film’s producer. The duo has worked together on several feature films, such as the disturbing “The Favourite”, acclaimed by critics in 2018 (currently available on Netflix).

“Pobres Criaturas”, in Portuguese translation, took years to be scripted and produced – until it was finalized as a fantastic and sumptuous epic. Set in the Victorian Era, the film tells the story of the greatest experience of scientist and professor Godwin Baxter, played by William Dafoe, who resurrects a suicidal pregnant woman by transporting the fetus’s brain instead.

The being who is reborn, Bella Baxter, has the body of a woman and the mind of a child – but she will evolve rapidly, surprising both her creator, whom she calls “God”, and the scientist’s assistant, who falls madly in love with Bella. . The unusual creature begins to look at the world with innocence but extreme curiosity. What does she like most? Of sex, naturally.

“Why don’t people do this all the time?” is what Bella will ask her first lover, Duncan Weddburn, played by Mark Rufallo.

Our protagonist’s journey of self-discovery is a steamy sexual adventure. From the first masturbation exercises to furious riding with Duncan, Bella gives herself over to pleasure in an overwhelming way. “The whole film is a metaphor”, as Emma Stone commented on Stephen Colbert’s program last January:

“It was my most complex and challenging role,” she admitted, to a fascinated audience. “Somehow the character synthesizes this fantasy of being confident, free from conditioning, guided only by intuition and desire. Bella acts as a woman would in the world, if we hadn’t been influenced by male norms, customs and expectations.”

The fantasy film could also be defined as a dramatic, romantic and futuristic punk, which takes us through an artificial and spectacular world – from London at the beginning of the 19th century, the film takes us on a circumnavigation journey that includes Lisbon, Alexandria and Paris. The extravagant locations, combined with costumes that evoke both Victorian fashion and the colors and cuts of the 1960s and 1970s, seek to expand our understanding of Bella’s world:

“She acts in an intuitive and, naturally, surreal way”, observed the protagonist, “but this is another provocation of the film, which leads us to reflect on absurdities that we may still be experiencing today”.