7.8 | / 10 |
Users | 5.0 | |
Reviewer | 3.5 | |
Overall | 3.6 |
The incredible tale about the fantastical evolution of Bella Baxter, a young woman brought back to life by the brilliant and unorthodox scientist Dr. Godwin Baxter.
Starring: Emma Stone, Mark Ruffalo, Willem Dafoe, Ramy Youssef, Christopher AbbottSurreal | 100% |
Dark humor | 95% |
Coming of age | 54% |
Sci-Fi | Insignificant |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 1.66:1
Original aspect ratio: 1.66:1
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 (48kHz, 24-bit)
French: Dolby Digital 5.1 (640 kbps)
Spanish: Dolby Digital 5.1 (640 kbps)
Spanish: DTS 5.1 (48kHz, 24-bit)
German: Dolby Digital 5.1 (640 kbps)
Italian: Dolby Digital 5.1 (640 kbps)
English SDH, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Spanish, Danish, Dutch, Finnish, Norwegian, Swedish
Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Digital copy
Slipcover in original pressing
Region A, B (C untested)
Movie | 3.5 | |
Video | 5.0 | |
Audio | 5.0 | |
Extras | 1.5 | |
Overall | 3.5 |
There's weird, and then there's Yorgos Lanthimos weird. While The Favourite for all its eccentricities may have convinced those following Lanthimos' cinematic career that he was tamping things down a bit in favor of more generally commercial and "accessible" offerings, Poor Things returns to more of the downright gonzo qualities that helped to define both The Lobster and The Killing of a Sacred Deer. As I mentioned in reviews of both of those last named films, there was an undeniable "WTF" quotient to them, and that situation is most definitely in (full) force with regard to Poor Things, though in this case the film's dazzling production design may be enough to distract those who might otherwise not care much for this kind of quasi-feminist reworking of certain tropes from the Frankenstein canon. In this case, the "good" (?) doctor is named Godwin Baxter (Willem Dafoe), and he's a horribly disfigured, scarred elder whose physical injuries turn out to have been caused by his own surgeon father, who used his son as an experimental guinea pig. The Baxter family is evidently quite interested in experimenting on humans, so when a pregnant suicide victim washes up to be claimed by Baxter, he performs a Caesarian on the corpse, and then transplants the unborn baby's brain into the (dead) mother's skull, ultimately reanimating her to be a veritable "woman child" (as opposed to a man child) named Bella (Emma Stone).
Poor Things is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of 20th Century Studios' Searchlight division and Disney / Buena Vista with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.66:1. The main making of supplement included on this disc has some interesting information about "special order" 35mm Ektachrome film that was utilized for this shoot, and the entirety of this presentation offers a really appealingly organic appearance, despite any number of tweaks done in post, some of which may be easily discernable in some of the screenshots I've uploaded to accompany this review. Repeated uses of everything from fisheye lenses to quasi-iris effects can distort the imagery (in both black and white and color), but detail levels remain remarkably consistent (one possible exception is the very corners of the frame in some of the fisheye material, where things are understandably blurred). The palette has been graded to any number of interesting hues, with some of the supposed "African" material's deep yellows among the more memorable. But there is an almost carnival like display of cotton candy colors in other moments, where pastels can predominate on some production design elements that may remind some of the great old Patrick McGoohan series The Prisoner. This was strikingly shot by Robbie Ryan (another Academy Award nomination I won't be very surprised to see this film win), and it receives really stellar support via this 1080 presentation, but it seems positively mind boggling that the powers that be aren't granting this film a 4K UHD release as of the writing of this review.
Poor Things features a DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 track that provides consistent surround activity courtesy of both pretty ubiquitous ambient environmental effects as well as kind of peculiar score from the wonderfully named Jerskin Fendrix (whose real name is evidently the only slightly less wonderful Joscelin Dent-Pooley). While there are some relatively traditional underscoring choices, Fendrix also toys with snippets of tones, tweaking them to bend and swoop, giving some of the accompaniment a deliberately hallucinatory feeling that is obviously meant to echo the similarly psychedelic visuals. Once Bella gets out into the world, there are a number of scenes where background clamor is noticeable, though the entire sound design seems intentionally "artificial" in, again, the same way the visuals can be. Dialogue (which occasionally veers into French in the brothel scenes in particular) is presented cleanly and clearly. Optional subtitles in several languages are available.
I'm certainly aware what a critics' darling Poor Things has been, and so if I may be permitted a review-centric joke, I was kind of relieved to see my colleague Brian Orndorf had an even less positive take on the film, which you can read here. Now, don't get me wrong, I unabashedly enjoyed watching Poor Things, but it never struck me as being as hilarious as it seemed to want to be, and its allegorical ambitions vis a vis female empowerment and sexual liberation are arguably questionable, at least insofar as they're presented, something that may admittedly be distorted by how surreal so much of the imagery is. As mentioned above, I'm frankly surprised this is evidently not getting a 4K UHD release, since the visuals are so amazing, but this 1080 disc offers superior technical merits, and the main making of supplement is very enjoyable. Recommended.
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