a b Kroll, Justin (July 25, 2023). "Searchlight's 'Poor Things' Starring Emma Stone Pushes Release Date From September To December". Deadline Hollywood . Retrieved July 25, 2023. Poor Things is based on a novel of the same name by Alasdair Gray. The Scottish writer released the book in 1992, when it won both the Guardian Fiction Prize and the Whitbread Award. Gray’s novel is fictitious, with loose ties to Mary Shelley’s gothic novel Frankenstein. Searchlight Pictures has released a teaser for the new Emma Stone movie Poor Things — and unlike many teasers, this trailer deserves the name, featuring only 30 seconds of footage and one line of dialogue (two, if you count an extremely camp “ow” from Mark Ruffalo).

Les premiers titres de la programmation! - Festival International du Film de La Roche-sur-Yon" (in French). August 31, 2023 . Retrieved November 7, 2023. Verhoeven, Beatrice (November 16, 2023). "Emma Stone to Receive Desert Palm Achievement Actress Award at Palm Springs International Film Fest". The Hollywood Reporter . Retrieved November 16, 2023. From the weird and wonderful mind of Greek director Yorgos Lanthimos comes Poor Things. After the success of past films such as The Lobster and The Killing of a Sacred Deer, Lanthimos has established himself as one of Hollywood’s most original auteurs, and is known for his thought-provoking storylines. Lanthimos’ films have also received critical acclaim, with 2018’s The Favourite winning the Grand Jury Prize at the 75th Venice International Film Festival, and earning ten Academy Award nominations with Olivia Colman winning for Best Actress.

Who’s in the Poor Things cast?

Even though Bella has obviously been through trauma in her life, it just isn't there for her now. She was the most joyous character in the world to play, because she has no shame about anything. She's new, you know? I've never had to build a character before that didn't have things that had happened to them or had been put on them by society throughout their lives. It was an extremely freeing experience to be her. [18] Rottenberg, Josh (November 11, 2021). "Joel Coen's 'The Tragedy of Macbeth' has big stars. But it's Kathryn Hunter who steals the show". Los Angeles Times. Archived from the original on January 25, 2022 . Retrieved December 10, 2021. a b Lodge, Guy (September 1, 2023). " 'Poor Things' Review: Emma Stone and Yorgos Lanthimos Fly Their Freak Flags in a Delicious Coming-of-Age Story Like No Other". Variety . Retrieved September 1, 2023.

This is a decent summary, but it omits some of the juicier and funnier details of Gray’s plot and characterization. Let’s break it down by character — with the caveat that Lanthimos and screenwriter Tony McNamara (who co-wrote The Favourite and Stone’s Cruella as well as creating the TV show The Great) may not have wanted, or been able to, replicate all of these on screen. Zacharek, Stephanie (September 1, 2023). "Venice Review: Emma Stone Works Twisted Fairytale Magic in Poor Things". Time . Retrieved September 6, 2023. Yorgos Lanthimos and Stone on the set of Poor Things. Photo: Atsushi Nishijima. Courtesy of Searchlight Pictures The film’s take on female sexuality and agency feels so fresh; Emma, what do you hope that people take away from your portrayal of Bella? Hammond, Jennifer. Alasdair Gray: A Postmodernist Reading of" Lanark"," 1982 Janine," and" Poor Things". Diss. University of North Carolina at Wilmington, 1999. Poor Things premiered at the 80th Venice International Film Festival on September 1, 2023, where it won the Golden Lion, and is scheduled to be released in the United States on December 8, 2023, and in the United Kingdom on January 12, 2024, by Searchlight Pictures.

The film’s take on female sexuality and agency feels so fresh; Emma, what do you hope that people take away from your portrayal of Bella?

The book, however, appends a letter, to be unsealed and read only in 1974 (sixty years after she wrote it) by Victoria "Bella" McCandless, in which she comments on McCandless' story and sets the record straight (or, if you wish, skews it further). It's such a fairy tale, and a metaphor—clearly, this can't actually happen—but the idea that you could start anew as a woman, as this body that's already formed, and see everything for the first time and try to understand the nature of sexuality, or power, or money or choice, the ability to make choices and live by your own rules and not society's—I thought that was a really fascinating world to go into." Willem Dafoe’s ‘Poor Things’ Makeup Took Six Hours Each Day to Get On: I’d Show Up at 3 A.M., ‘Meditating and Trying to Deal With Standing Still’ These fictitious historical documents are prefaced with an introduction by one Alasdair Gray, who presents himself as the editor of the following text, and relates the "discovery" of the papers by his real-life friends, Michael Donnelly and Elspeth King. The introduction also hosts a critique of Glasgow City Council's treatment of its culture and heritage in the neglect of the local history museum, and a brief mention of Glasgow's time as the European Capital of Culture in 1990, which was the subject of a more sustained satire in his novel Something Leather. The film was originally slated for theatrical release in September 2023, but due to the ongoing WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes, it will not be commercially available until January 12, 2024 in the United Kingdom. The film is scheduled for an earlier December 8, 2023 release in the US. Who is in the cast of ‘Poor Things’?

The movie looks heavily visually stylized, almost fantastical, while the book takes place in a semi-realistic Victorian world with a few Gothic flourishes. The opening shots of the trailer nod to the Frankenstein story, which Gray riffed on for his book. Otherwise, the film seems to focus on Bella and Wedderburn’s steamship tour. In the book, she has other adventures, including a spell in a Parisian brothel, and a lot of time is spent with Godwin and McCandless (whom Bella calls “Candle”) moping around in Glasgow in her absence. Nonetheless, there’s a lot to intrigue and mystify in this collection of surreal imagery from the mind of director Yorgos Lanthimos ( The Lobster, The Favourite). And it’s not just from Lanthimos’ mind. Poor Things is an adaptation of the 1992 novel by the idiosyncratic Scottish author and illustrator Alasdair Gray, who very much had his own set of preoccupations (including sex, socialism, and typesetting — he not only illustrated all his own books but typeset them by hand).a b Bradshaw, Peter (September 1, 2023). "Poor Things review – Emma Stone has a sexual adventure in Yorgos Lanthimos's virtuoso comic epic". The Guardian . Retrieved September 3, 2023.