'POOR THINGS' MADE ME SICK: I'M REDESIGNING IT
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- Опубліковано 16 чер 2024
- I have never been a hater like this ever in my whole life
Please let me know what you think of this format! I wanted to try out something new in the new year so this is a bit more of a video essay/movie critique with art supporting it rather than a straight art video. Any comments or opinions would be SO appreciated!!
CONTENT WARNING!!! This movie is very R rated, I try to talk around things in the least upsetting way possible BUT there is still mention of SH, SA, real and fictional instances of pregnancy loss and morally dubious relationships.
It's also the most aggressive critique I think I've ever posted so if you love this movie please feel free to skip this video! I'm pretty harsh so if that would make you sad then its totally okay to skip.
0:00 - Intro
1:13 - Frankenstein Context
2:13 - Synopsis
7:42 - Problems with the Movie
12:33 - Bella Redesign
14:35 - Script Doctoring the Ending
15:59 - Different Take on 'Feminist Frankenstein'
20:00 - Wrap up
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It’s insane someone managed to turn Frankenstein into: “ What if we had a bunch of men take advantage of a woman, but she’s actually an underage girl/baby on the inside! “
You know what they say, it's the inside that counts
what a way to completely ignore the books background, completely ignore the source material. Anyone that read the book knows that this whole video is just bullshit. ITS NOT BASED ON FRANKENSTEIN. CHECK YOUR FACTS BEFORE YOU SLANDER SOMETHING
And Hollywood wonders why everyone thinks they're all creeps
When she summarized the movie, I was like "that's just Lolita but even worse somehow" 😭
Edit: by worse I mean the things that happen to Bella are somehow even more revolting than what happens to Dolores in her novel.
Just a fantasy too many people have 🤮
I haven’t seen anyone talk about the novel “poor things.” The movie leaves out the ending. In the book you find out the whole narrative was a fake story written by her husband to infantilize her. In the book you find out Bella was actually a feminist doctor who who advocated for women, but her husband was jealous and wrote a story about her being a “child monster.” When she found the story she asked to have it burned.
Excuse me what. THATS LIKE THE MOST IMPORTANT INFORMATION ABOUT THE PLOT.
this comment needs more likes lol
That's like adapting Lolita and not realizing the protagonist is supposed to be the bad guy!
@@sarahbogaert6017 I know right, and they just left out. I was practically screaming in the theater when it ended
@@ninjabluefyre3815 ugh another book I really like that’s been ruined in adaptations
I watched it and I hated it. I was thinking the whole time “THATS A CHILD!!!”
"i don't understand how to eat food but men sure like it when i bounce up & down on their genitals so i'm just going to do that. feminism!"
Not even a child … A.WHOLE.ASS.BABY 😭😭😭
I have not seen it, so bear with me, but is that not the point? That the ideal woman is a literal infant who will go along with whatever a man says and has a sexy body?
These men ARE disgusting, you are meant to be disgusted
thats pretty much the point. the whole thesis of the movie is how men view women. so its pretty telling how gross the men are in this movie is when their attracted to what is essentially a child in a woman’s body, and how they get less attracted when she becomes more mature and intelligent. a lot of men in the real world are like this (the movie just depicted it in an extremely on the nose way)
@@FF-ch9nr ) then where are the incels boycotting the film?
The new story you wrote reminds me a bit of a young adult graphic novel I read a bit ago. In this story, called "M is for Monster" it's a brief retelling of Frankenstein. The doctor in this story tried to revive her sister, but the new creature she has created is a different person, whom she gives the name of Frankie. Throughout the story, Frankie sees the ghost of her body's original owner. She struggles as the ghost tells her how to act, and what to do, even though she clearly doesn't like the same things she does. In the ending, she admits to the doctor everything that happened, and they finally make a proper headstone for her sister.
New book to add to my collection!
read this recently too! hah bald
Is this just horror or is there other things?
@@nadiahapsari3359as far as i could see from the preview is not horror, you can go read it, there's a 50 page preview on google, it's great! I wish i could buy it but I'm broke lol
Wasn't frankie the nickname of the sister doctor? Full name Frances ai if i recall correctly
"These film makers aren't afraid to break boundaries when it comes to putting in morally dispicable sex scenes in their movies, but they wouldn't dream of having a quote on quote ugly woman on screen for more than a minute of two." PREACH
I know! It's so common in media nowadays, maybe just as common as it used to be in old movies, (despite what the directors say) and it makes me sick. The number of movies I have been enjoying then shut off as soon as an unnecessary sex/rape scene comes on is too many to count. As someone who has been interested in directing a TV show since I first came about movies/TV shows as a kid, it really needs to change soon.
@@strawberrylipstick3231even worse is when it’s portrayed as ‘empowering’ like yea sex isn’t something to be ashamed of but writing a movie where a woman gets exploited over and over and over again is shameful!!
unrelated, love the pfp :)
And when the "ugly" woman is there for too long, she's made fun of for her appearance
@@bob_marlee03 Same, it's nice to see some Higurashi fans
The original Frankenstein was a feminist book when you consider the backstory. It was written by Mary Shelley in 1816 and published 2 years later. Not only was Mary 18 when she wrote it, but it was also her first book, and now it's considered the first science fiction novel.
Thats insane to think she was 18. Ive read it and it was amazing. Heard she finished most during one night with a bottle x)
And she wrote it from a dare to write a horror story!
I also love that she was the reason why one of her friends (the guy that wrote Dracula) to also publish his story because he was scared that nobody would like his story but because she told him it was great he published his own monster story
Edit: typo
Not to mention her mother was an influential early feminist and thinker who eschewed social norms of her day and had a fascinating life, where she went to France to witness and be involved with the politics of the French Revolution.
She also had to publish it anonymously because if a woman wrote a murder mystery, she could have faced severe backlash.
I’m still confused as to why they thought to get rid of the bodily scars and “imperfections” that were on the original “Frankenstein” like that’s one of the KEY points in the story???
Edit: I understand that the movie was based on the novel “Poor Things”, but I have one question to all the people telling me that…
Do you believe that the director did a good job to show the “greatness”of the novel? (I haven’t read the novel so I don’t have an opinion on it)
first of all, the original novel described Frankenstein as being made in the perfect image. he was flawless except for the uncanny, lifeless look in his eyes. second of all, even if we’re going off of the movie, he’s all scarred because he was out together from dismembered body parts, whereas Bella was found dead and revived with a transplanted brain. she does have a scar on her head from the surgery, and another from her pregnancy.
*edited for spelling
@@galibobali we get it, bro, you really wish it was legal to fuck toddlers and women with lobotomies, you don't have to keep pretending this movie was good.
@@galibobali That's not true at all. Frankenstein (the scientist) chose parts of bodies that he thought were beautiful individually but when they all came together in reanimation, the final result was horrendous, which is why he was disgusted and ran from his own "son". That's like the main driver of the plot as almost everyone who encounters him is disturbed by his appearance. Mary Shelley described him as hideous.
@galibobali ......I think you need to reread the book girl
@@1Xpandi EXACTLY!!
Also the beauty standard of women shaving off body hair only came about in the 1920s when dresses started getting shorter and didn't even exist in the time period it's set in
Yes, because the rest of the movie perfectly follows historical accurate costuming and set designs, and doesn’t at all create its own world merely inspired by the time period. Like come on now. Like I’m obviously not saying body hair is bad, but to specifically critique this movies accuracy like it’s EMMA is outrageous.
@@reddean4712 Seconded. Historical accuracy is obviously not a talking point here. It's a fantasy movie.
That said, I understand the knee-jerk aggravation only out of my own sensitivity to it. Nothing tickles my aimless-rage-button quite like women with freshly shaved legs in the middle of a zombie apocalypse, or some such. lol Fucking media.
@@reddean4712 ) why did they have to do it?
Nothing in the movie is set correctly to be accurate in its time period, I don't know why body hair is an important depiction to be accurate if nothing else is either
i know there isnt any accurate time period in the movie but still what was with that one outfit in portugal when she runs off from her hotel room it was just so out of place
this is the angriest I’ve ever seen Lavendertowne be, and I love it
IKR? My jaw dropped when I saw "disgusting" in the title 😭 that's harsh language for her
As an og fan FR
she’s so angry she isn’t whispering , she’s softy talking 😱😱
FR
That or the time she talked about EDs in her men writing women video.
Honestly 14:46 was the biggest wasted potential.
The movie really ALMOST had a moment where a victim of the “born sexy yesterday” trope is now older and is able to see another “infant” unknowingly experiencing the same thing.
The main character can then notice all the things she never noticed before. As a “child” she saw all the men as friends or parental figures, but she sees now, when they are interacting with the new “child”, that they are just manipulating her and are only being predatory over her body.
I feel that it would’ve been a wonderful, heart-breaking movie about pedophilia, mental/physical disability, grooming, and manipulation.
Honestly, yes.
it couldve been wonderful i think the plot had true potential, like seeing things that happened to you when you were a little girl happen to a girl when youre grown is such a real thing so many afab people experience and wanting to stop that cycle of abuse couldve been wonderful. but no it had to be more about oo sexy lady
They were THIS CLOSE to making a cute movie, but we can't have nice things.
@@reganraffield8113 EXACTLY!!!!
This could have been about the infantilization of women and the way abusers go after women that are dependent or easy to manipulate. Like, there is definitely a push for women to look and act cute, pure, innocent and childlike
ah, so there’s a reason none of the trailers actually told us anything about the plot 😬
When my dad and I watched the film, we thought it was a parody of the "born sexy yesterday" trope, and making fun of men who sexualise child like innocence wrapped in sexy clothing, but now I'm not so sure?? The whole child in an adult body having sex was WEIRD and disturbing though...
It’s based on a book that was intended as satire. But from lavender towns description it sounds like it was handled poorly
It is. This movie says a lot about how the society/men around Bella mistreat and take advantage of her while she is "growing up."
It turns while they're on the ship when Bella seeks out friends of her choosing, starts reading, and becomes aware that suffering exists. It continues with her choosing to work in a brothel despite what broader society would hoist on her for that decision, choosing a loving relationship with a woman, and attending community events via the socialist club. By the end, Bella recognizes her mistreatment but has to reconcile those feelings with the familial love she still has for Godwin.
While not perfect, I think this movie was pretty clear with its use of satire because the audience knows how weird/disturbing all the early scenes are considering Bella's mental/emotional age.
@@beebonious That's really well put, and that's kinda what I got from the movie as well. There were things like how she was always well shaven, and how she decided to marry a guy who wanted to marry her in the past, knowing she was pretty much a toddler, so in that sense I feel like the director could have handled it better.
its supposed to be weird and disturbing!! It is commentary!!
@@PapaPalina Yeah I agree, her relationship with Max was the only one I had mixed feelings about, because of that. There were good points to it, like flipping the expectation of exclusivity and loyalty. How in media men are portrayed as the adventurers who go off exploring and make their love wait for them at home for years, and usually experiment with other lovers along the way, while the woman is portrayed as waiting faithfully for her man to return and thinking none the less of him when he does, and all this is just fine. But of course for most people the idea of a woman doing that to a man is outrageous and scandalous, and the man respecting that decision is seen as pathetic and/or abused. This is the only example I think I've ever seen in media that flipped those roles, so I appreciate that about their relationship.
I do agree that him being framed as the acceptable life partner after his initial predatory interest was questionable. The best way I could look at this is as a statement on women's options, and on the complexity of forgiveness in a system that facilitates and encourages abusive and exploitative behavior. If that was the intention, I don't think they got that across as well as they could have. However art is interpretable and I otherwise enjoyed the movie, so this is how I choose to see the conclusion of that plotline.
Ah, we love it when men repackage things that are a net negative for women as being "feminist."
And I love it even more when critics praise those half ass attempts of "feminism" for being brave and innovative when all it has is women doing stuff meanwhile movies like Nemona get "Wikipedia article on dysphoria" ass reviews
Wait, what's wrong with the wikipedia article on dysphoria?
@@bloomypeach6168 (for context I'm saying this as a trans person) I was mostly criticizing how a lot of media critics almost never demand representation that goes beyond "half deep explorations of character" as those are both easily marketable while getting all the brownie points
Ex: how a lot of movies are praised for adding more representation when all they did was put/recast a random character as a POC or other minority without actually exploring the character in any meaningful way
Movies like Nemona that genuinely grapple with the struggles of queerness, identify and self love get the same surface level analysis and review that are almost insulting to the intentions of the original creators
My critic of the "Wikipedia article on dysphoria" ass reviews is that a lot of movies critics genuinely boiled down the story to its most bare bones progressive interpretation without any of the systematic critic(some of them literally spell out what dysphoria means to the audience)
@airplanes_aren.t_real I am 1000% using that description of surface level critiques going forward, that is BRILLIANT (also, I’m trans too. High five)
except its not repackaged, its not based on frankenstein, its based on a great book of the same name, stop spreading false hate over made up facts
from the description of it, it doesn’t sound like a “feminist movie”, it just sounds like the director put all his disgusting fantasies into it.
As per usual
Sometimes the answer is usually very simple. I think both the director and writer are creeps lol
@@Shatt3r3d_R3ality ngl trying to argue with the "everyone in Hollywood is pedo" conspiracy theorists feels more like an uphill battle every day and movies like these *do not help*
I just hope that's not the case...
I haven’t seen the movie yet. But the idea of a what’s basically a baby being sexually abused is disgusting. I can’t even fathom what that has to do with the story of Frankenstein or how that could be feminist in any way. This feels all kinds of creepy
Removing the ending from the original novel, and pretending as if this entire situation had been real? That made zero sense from a storytelling perspective. The best line of the book comes from Bella: "It's a work that positively stinks of all that was morbid in that most morbid of centuries." That got a laugh out of me.
Little warning here my tangent does have a few spoilers but I couldn't help myself I just finished reading this in AP Lit.
I think most people completely missed a key theme in Frankenstein. The danger of knowledge. Victor created life against warning. The creature learned of the unfair treatment ugly people like him receive. And Walton is warned by Victor against his ventures. The stories original title was "Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus" Victor is Prometheus. Warned by others (Zeus) not to pursue knowledge (giving fire to the humans). But he disregards this and puts other's lives in danger. He suffers because of this as well.
This movie could've have shown this so well. Almost in a Barbie movie way. Bella could've learned of the terrible treatment women receive and feel so distraught that she wishes not to live on (as Victor feels when the creature basically ruins his life). But instead, she could've overcome her circumstances and fought against the male gaze. And making her as grotesque as the creature in Frankenstein would've been a lot better. It would show that women aren't just their appearance. Mental capacity is more important.
That would've been feminist. The feminist aspect of this movie is completely lost. And as someone else in this comment section put it, the movie seems very Lolita esk.
I literally have no idea why this film was called feminist. Like you said, the feminist theme was off.
The moment i heard a baby s brain in a women’s body i knew it wasn’t going to be about feminism….
It’s a surrealist movie it’s not supposed to be taken as “feminist”. As a woman I relate heavily to Bella’s character in the movie.
@@cyndlehick9777You okay?
@@genericname2747 Probably not
@@cyndlehick9777 I do as well, though I would actually call it feminist, both in the way they undermine and expose the "born sexy yesterday" trope, and through the general metaphor of her experience for that of women growing into maturity in a predatory world. Either way, I think people are taking the movie far too literally.
@@La-PetitMort Bro, how are you two going to virtue signal AND shit on someone relating to an abused character in the same breath? The lack of self-reflection is wild.
"Let's yassify Igor."
As a spooky creep that loves Renfield, Golem and other side villain characters, I have waited my whole life to hear these words and have never loved you more.
I fully agree with you
Yesss absolutely
bro Renfield is awsome. I love how crazy he acts
we love Renfield here!
Imagine a dark comedy that's just a side villain support group. Reinfield and Igor just complaining about their bosses
Poor things is made after the book of the same title, it's about how men like to take advantage of women. When main character starts gaining autonomy and learns about the world, men in her life are displeased.
So why does she have to be an experiment?
the book tells that the story is her husband's fantasy because he was jealous of her
the movie does none of that, and you don't need countless nude scenes focusing on female nudity to hammer the point of men taking advantage of her, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo did the same point and did it better
This video has actually helped me solidify what it was that was bothering me about the movie. I thought it was fantastic from its visuals and overall filmmaking technique, but something was bugging me with each passing minute, and it only got worse and worse as the film went on. I kept trying to rationalize it in my head, assuming that as a man i was just missing the point, but I actually think I can pinpoint the exact thing that made me realize why the movie wasn't working on a narrative level. I'm not particular squeemish or prudeish or made uncomfortable by sex or sex scenes, but as a pansexual person, I noticed that there was a clear dissidence between the framing and the writing.
If the movie is supposed to be about liberating female sexuality, why is the female body the only one the camera and framing focus on during the sex scenes? As I said before, I'm pan and as I've gotten older I've really started to notice how male bodies are never quite sexualized the same way female bodies are. And in this case, it struck me as odd that the movie sets up Bella as desiring sexual relationships with men, but never presents men as sexual objects. It's always Bella herself who is the focus of the sexualization. It's always her body and reactions, her nudity that is focused on. The shots are drowning in male gaze which conflicts with the idea that the movie is about female gaze. The film never shoots men as sexually appealing or attractive, its sticks to making sure Bella's attractiveness is prioritized. The movie sets up Bella as viewing Mark Ruffallo's character Duncan as some sexy adventurous man, but he's never shot that way. His body is never highlighted, or shown in a sexual light. he's not given the over the top organismic reactions to sex, Because unlike Emma Stone or any of the other women shown nude on screen, Mark Ruffalo is not a sex symbol, none of the men in the movie are. If the character was played by Channing Tatum or Reyn Gosling and the shots took time to lear on their bodies and nudity during the sex scenes, It may have had a point to make. But it doesn't. The movie can say its all about a woman's story of sexual liberation, but it's still a movie that exists to show a fetishized conventionally attractive woman who has lots of sex and who likes having sex but only in so far as its appealing to a male fantasy. She even perfectly fills the occasionally bisexual quota so they can have a graphic lesbian sex scene thats shot like a p()rno so the idea of her being intimate with women can exist within the confines of male fantasy.
and in all honesty, it makes me sad that people think this movie is about sexual liberation, it seems like everyone just stopped watching after the second act. Sex, there it was. Bella found freedom through sex, that gave meaning to her life and made her an actualized person. The end. Come on guys, let’s think past the shock. Sex was only one of the facets of her hedonistic phase. she delve into it the same way she stuffed herself with pastries. I have seen pg 13 movies sexualize woman’s body with slow motion zooms of random body parts that serve no point to the story. If showing a nude body is sexualizing it, i’m sorry but there are man naked in this too. Bella never wears corsets or make up (apart from the brothel phase), no bodice making her curves more visible. Duncan in the other hand, wears corsets, heals, butt pads, calves and thighs pads in order to make his body more attractive and voluminous. His curves are highlighted and exaggerated in every single scene he appears in the movie like a freaking peacock.
Name a more iconic duo than men taking an already feminist story and trying to make it "more feminist" by turning the female characters permanently sexy and always willing to sleep with and show their bodies to men.
That's why they hated She-Hulk so much. It's made through a distinctly feminist lens, and they won't tolerate that.
@@WobblesandBeanso that’s why she hulk got so much hate. I never got to watch it so I couldn’t find out for myself why it was bad
you took the words out my mouth. The audacity to proclaim that a man somehow made a more feminist version of a book that was originally written by a woman, during a time when it was a feminist act to simply write a book as a woman.
@@shannarafryer3111It has to do with the fact it was a feminist show and a comedy, men wanted an action show and for the lead girl to have flaws but not flaws that would dare make her seem unlikable, not like humans are inherently flawed creatures
The show isn't perfect but it definitely got way too hate for just being a comedy show
@shannarafryer3111 It's not like, the best show ever but for what it is its pretty good actually.
Can we just acknowledge how obnoxious it is that this is supposed to be a 'feminist remaster' of a story WRITTEN BY A WOMAN that is MADE BY A MAN?
YO THIS IS NOT A MARY SHELLY RETELLING🗣️🗣️🔊🔊🔊🔊🔥🔥🔥🔥STOP SPEWING NONSENSE
@@iseeyou2211 calm down
@@iseeyou2211 While the novel Poor Things was written by Alasdair Gray and published in 1992, it absolutely draws from Mary Shelley's Frankenstein with intent. However, the novel seems to have the corpse resurrection and infant brain swap of Bella later refuted by Bella (Victoria) herself as something her husband made up out of the prevailing gothic motifs of the Victorian times.
yeahhhh. that put me off instantly.
fr I couldn't stop thinking about that
Your new retelling me reminds me of a graphic novel called 'M for Monster!'. It's about a sister who resurrects her other sister after a terrible accident, but they're an entirely new person. It's a very good read, and absolutely beautiful scenes!
Omg i love that book! Super fun read ❤️
@@ThatGalWithTheRawMeat yeah!!
oh nice! maybe ill check it out. seems like a good read
From the trailers, I was expecting it to be about a robot girl learning about the world with her creator, but this is so much WORSE 😭
That said, I would pay actual money to see Lav’s ALTERNATIVE idea put on the big screen. That sounds so good!
"So basically, she looks like an adult but has the brain of a baby, so inside she's still a child!"
...sir did you just make the literal opposite of a loli
Like in Xavier renegade angel there's a 14 year old who looks like a 80 year old, so poor things didn't made it first
I'd say, a reverse loli. The concepts are swapped, but, functionally, it's still loli.
It’s objectively worse. For a loli could demonstrate a level of maturity where a reverse loli could not.
@@jaredgreen2363 real
Probbably like the original creature of Frankeinsten's experiment, they looked like an adult but were just born.
I've never heard of this film, but from the sounds of it they completely wasted the potential to create an interesting abstract film about the horrors of grooming and pedophilia,and instead made... a gross film for creeps.
And praised for being a "feminist retelling"
This was my overall feeling!!! Like it had so much potential. :
@@LavenderTowne potential is as indicative of how high something can fly as it is to how low it can sink
Good golly you're right! The starting premise allows for you to cast an adult actor, meaning you don't have to deal with the whole "how to portray a fictional child being put in these kinds of situations without harming the real child who's cast as them" issue (like that "Cuties" film had).
if people actually watch the film they will realise how the men actually *are* portrayed as controlling creeps and audiences are not encouraged to align with them LOL
the point of Bella being shaved and the question about who does it for her and that it doesn't reflect living without shame is a good point that many people may miss to question
“She goes on a walk with this loser.” PREACH!!! I cracked up laughing 😂 I loved this video to pieces and absolutely adored how you articulated every critique I had about the movie in such a clear way ❤
*Just realized, the movie never actually verifies whether or not the money Bella gave away was even GOING to the poor people. I thought the movie was gonna talk more about class wherein Bella was gonna find out that the guards had pocketed the money instead of giving it away, inciting a discussion about corruption or smth. BUT THEY NEVER CIRCLED BACK TO THAT. I had to stifle my laughter cuz I kept thinking, "lol when she sees those guards with some fancy stuff to show off wealth, she's gonna make the surprised Pikachu face."
This movie is the peak example of “the writer’s barely disguised fetish”
If You Google yorgos filmography You Will SEE that his firts work, was a 10 minute film that is based on the r4pe of a woman ... Sooooooooooooo ...
That's not the only one of his films that does that...
baby's first Lanthimos movie
Please I'ma throw up 😭
That's not even a fetish. That is borderline pedophilia 💀
Also calling a literal disabled lobotomized abused fetus inside of a woman a "wierd, freakish character" is SO ODD to me like NOTHING about the response to this movie sits right with me. It really, truly, honestly seems like people trying to normalize exploitation as good art and not a literal tradgedy?? There is art to be made IN tradgedy, but this is literally just full, unadulterated despair, not all art is good, sometimes people just create actual shit but its not good art just because it's different, it is quite literally just creating abuse for people to gawk at like congratulation here is your medallion idk
I dunno, I agree with you, but a baby's mind in a full grown adult's body is inherently "weird" and "freakish" to me. Exploitative? Definitely. Gross? In spades. But also weird and freaky in the most negative of ways
@Twilarose77 I agree but I was referring to the rotten tomatoes comment when Lavendertowne was talking about the second "experiment"... the person in the comment was like praising the movie saying "I like how there's not one character who isn't strange in this film" like it is just very very weird to me to see a film about what is essentially a child's response to being sexually abused and praise her for being "FREAKISH" LIKE??? I'm not saying they're not freakish it just seems like the purpose of this movie is to gawk at the main character's struggle rather than think about the implications of it?? This film does not answer most of the questions that it proposes which makes me think that the main reason why it exists is to show people something horrific and expect them to go "wow how thoughtful" it is so absolutely lame and weird. What are we doing why are we doing this
The comment to me kinda makes me feel like my point is valid like we're not here to talk about the events of the movie we're just going to praise it for being different, which does not by itself make it good! It's a beautiful and weird movie but it's substance is quite ugly and hollow and lame
@@smokugoku Ah I see, my bad
This is slightly off-topic but this is LITERALLY EXACTLY how i feel about ladybird and the response. It's quite precisely abuse for people to gawk at and watching it I was horrified and angry...and people found it FUNNY???? You've put it into words really well, hate when a film does that
The world does not like things that make them uncomfortable. This id especially true with art and especially cinema award institutions. This movie appeals to men with the fact that Bella’s whole story revolves around the men in her life, and of course, the Born Sexy Yesterday trope at full display. This is a movie that comforts the status quo while hiding within a facade of “feminism” so that they can’t be called out for being sexist and exploitative
This was a super interesting video.
When I first saw the movie I thought perhaps it was made to purposefully make you uncomfortable, by showing the toxicity of male gaze and infantilisation of women in LITERAL terms by having them abuse someone with a child’s brain. I didn’t like how explicit it was, and it felt sloppy in its “feminism.”
However it could be said to in a way show how ingrained and unnoticed these disgusting infatuations can be.
In the movie male characters are attracted to her nativity and childishness, not knowing at the time she has the brain of a baby. Does it challenge how these attitudes are socialised/to be expected? I’m not so sure.
Also the ending felt rushed and cheap to me, resolving in a bogus ‘happy ever after’ without actually answering or addressing any of the foul things Bella was subjected to.
Overall I think it definitely fell short, was unnecessarily explicit and reinforces why certain topics really just shouldn’t be tackled by men. But if you squint there’s some worthwhile interpretations to be made.
I gotta agree here it made an honest attempt at satire and social commentary but fell short by focusing too much on the wrong aspects
Yeah I was surprised that it’s labeled ‘feminist’, I thought it was an artsy horror movie about the predatory nature of men.
Poor Things is based on a book but (in my opinion) your critique is still correct because the changes done contradict so many messages from the book. The book is a false manuscript written by Max (the last husband and God's assistant) to kinda make fun of his wife, Bella. There is an extra "chapter" at the end of the book written by her saying it is a ridiculous and unoriginal approach of female power made by a man. I think the main mistake of this movie is focusing so much in sexuality (and not even on a realistic way) and leaving so many other themes unexplored. People feel like this movie innovates just because it's new but that isn't true, it's the same story wrapped up on beautiful production and costume design. It's not the worse movie but I am so tired of people giving it too much credit and overseeing its CLEAR weaknesses just because its made by an "artsy and weird" director who is using social movements as marketing because he is "not like other men".
Well put.
i genuinely cant believe that he said this movie was feminist and everyone was just like 'ok' like what ITS LIKE THE OPPOSITE
Sometimes people think “feminist” means “has a woman lead”
I feel like what people don’t understand is that a woman sleeping with multiple different people is only empowering if ITS HER CHOICE. A WOMAN GETTING TAKEN ADVANTAGE OF IS NOT FEMINISM 😭
I feel that now, everytime they put a woman as the central focus point of a movie, no matter how gross, bad or mysoginist the plot actually is, they slap a "feminist story" on it to trick the watchers into believing it ISN'T gross, bad or mysoginist because "It can't be sexist if the heroine's a woman! And if you dislike it, it's because you're not feminist! uwu"
@@NearsightedNarhwal Not everything has to be "empowering" to be feminist. Sometimes feminism just means facing up to how ugly the world really is for women.
I heard nothing about this movie before going into it. No trailers, no reviews, nothing. I didn't know it existed until the day of, when my cousin dragged me off to see it in the theater. I concluded on my own that it was feminist, and was disappointed (though perhaps not surprised) to learn afterwards that so many people felt otherwise.
I didn’t know poor things was “girl Frankenstein” so when I read that title I thought this was gonna be utterly destroying “Lisa Frankenstein” which is a movie that looks like a campy masterpiece but hasn’t come out yet! So I straight up thought you were about to destroy a movie purely from a trailer
tbh it’s not ‘girl frankenstein’ it has elements similar to frankenstein but it’s not based on it at all it’s its own story
@@liamross340yeah I can tell that now as I watch the video, but from the title it really threw me off lmao
I like a lot of Diablo Cody movies so I’m actually pretty excited for Lisa Frankenstein!!!
Same, to be honest XD.
It’s been an hour how are there 342 likes omg
Girl, at this point, I would really love to see you as the creative mind behind a new movie. Every video that you make is solid, and totally logical, and you seriously outdo a lot of these writers. I hope one day I could see a movie or TV show by you seriously.
your idea for a frankenstein retelling is SO GOOD i would 100% watch it (especially if it was like an animated series with you involved in the creative process or something)
The final drawing at 20:13 makes me REALLY want to see an animated film or comic done with the type of storyline Lavender was talking about. She didn't have to go so hard on the scientist's design but I am here for it. Maybe one day we'll get a bombastic lesbian scientist duo like she was mentioning, but until that day; I shall wait.
Me listening to lavender talk about two hot science lesbians doing crimes against humanity: *LET HER COOK* 🗣🏳️🌈🗣🏳️🌈🗣🏳️🌈🗣
Literally would die for this film
I honestly love the new film concept at the end of the video. I’d love to see a full story made of it someday
Honestly same
Lik they would be this odd family, I would love a montage of their happy lives at the end of the movie or smth
im autistic and my special interest is frankenstein and yeah this movie made me so fucking ANGERY
I’m so glad someone else’s special interest is Frankenstein! I love the story so much 😭
Why? /gen
but it’s not based on frankenstein it’s its own thing 😭
@@liamross340 yeah but it does draw enough parallels between itself and the original tale that one could easily interpret it as at least "inspired by Frankenstein"
@@airplanes_aren.t_real from what ive seen, its marketed as a “girl/feminist frankenstein” but it has none of the themes or concepts of the actual frankenstein!!!!!!!! id be completely fine if they didnt keep it the exact same with characters n stuff, but this has nothing to do with frankenstein other than “oooo dead people, mad scientist, child”
The fact that this film won eight awards and Barbie didn't even win one! Seriously, it explains a lot about these events ( sorry for the bad English )
i interpreted the movie as being a criticism of the born sexy yesterday trope. i honestly found the majority of the sex scenes in the movie horrifying. it was about how disgusting these men were to take advantage of a literal child bc they thought she was hot. idk i just don’t agree that the movie was fetishizing her unintelligence, frankly i thought it was doing the opposite
Thank you. That's exactly what i thought. What she says in the video that all the men are disgusting for being with a woman with the literal brain of a child is precisely THE point of the movie. If you feel that the sex scenes and the movie itself are off putting in a lot of ways, that is precisely THE point. It should be off putting, it should be disgusting. But in the end, whatever, if everyone is going to hate the movie and the director for it, so be it, i don't care. But at least praise Emma Stone for her impecable acting because she did great. We all here believe that women should not be treated like this in real life and that's enough. We only defere in that not everything in art should be nice and beautiful and make everyone feel empowered and happy. Sometimes art is annoying and off putting and that helps us reflect more on the horridness of society itself. I did not like the ending either, lol, but the whole movie was a nice act of reflexion all in all.
@@ateneamaurtua okay where in the narrative do they actually SAY that it's disgusting, though? like does bella ever go "hang on a minute, i literally have the brain of a child and all of you men were absolutely gagging to get into my pants, that's revolting, you men are revolting"? no, no she doesn't. in fact she decides to go ahead and marry the FIRST guy who wanted in her pants when she was MOST toddler-like. she didn't do anything to the man who took advantage of her besides give away all his money, and she buries the man who created her with loving adoration. at no point is anyone ever called out for their disgusting behavior. how do you tell the difference between a movie that thinks this behavior is a good thing and a movie that thinks it's disgusting if neither one actually says "this is disgusting"?
@@dietotaku well that's the issue i don't think that everything needs to be said to be understood, the whole movie is off putting and it has this very off putting soundtrack, from the beginning the movie tries to mark a distance between the audience and the characters at display through the weird horror and surreal background. On the side of the scientists i have to admit that it was weird, and perhaps i'm a bit biased because i Guess i interpreted it wrong when i went to watch it(? You see, i read Frankenstein some time ago, and i genuinelly believed that it was implied that the "father" was frankenstein's creature itself, that had been raised by Frankenstein and not abandoned but "sheltered" by him and Made him pass like a real human... In that sense the weird experiments that had been made on him Made more sense, and his attitude towards bella Made more sense too, since it was something of a "creature that's been addapted to this patriarcal society who now wants to pay tribute to the legacy of his father Frankenstein who abused him" complicated sort of thing, that made the movie better for me really. On the other hand i feel like y'all are talking about the movie as if it was a totally normal film with down to earth characters, as if the characters and everything they said should be taken literally. When actually it should be interpreted more like a fable it has this "candide" vibe to it, all the characters are flawed, because patriarchy and we are just watching the surreal events as they show to make us think. We shouldn't just think about the character of Bella as a Bad adaptation por Frankenstein or as the kid who is being taken advantage of, and trust me, i know the born sexy yesterday trope, i was very wary of it since they beginning of the movie, and that's why i found that it was a suversion of the trope at the end. It felt more like a comment on it. On the weird assistance thing, the guy actually SAYS that he doesn't want to get into her pants... And speaks out about how Bella is going to be taken advantage of by the guy who eventually takes her and so on... He's no savior by no means, i believe that in the movie he looked more pathetic and confused than as an actual lover to Bella, it just doesn't feel like a romance it is more like another example of how patriarchy shapes relatively inoffensive individuals into questionable people. The relationship to bella with her sex worker friend or girlfriend idk, was by far more meaningful in the movie. The thing with the assistance felt more like a formality... And that's the thing, is a critique to social standards. Bella is a child with the body of an adult, the movie wants to show us how horrendous that would be, how horrendous stuff happens to girls who develop early, for example, how society is shaped in a way that if not being held captive, the world can eat a young girl alive. But there is more to it. Bella is not a convencional female character, not because she has sex or whatever, but because being an adult and having the strenght of an adult it is incredibly difficult to force her into the female standards most women endure, she is free from that, not only the sex stuff, but the being nice, the being cute, the having to shut her own needs to please others, but that also makes her unaware of a lot of stuff happening around her and leaves her a bit lost in a world that is so full of that bullshit and unable to utterly see her as a person more than as a peace of meat who acts cute on public spaces. It is a movie that has a lot to say, and i believe that it is a good thing that people are actually concerned about the child in woman body trope, Even though i believe that's the point of the movie it shows that they care, i hope that they care about that stuff happening in real time in real life too. I live in South America and trust me that is a horrible present issue that nobody dares to talk about some people are Even ok with ir or simply hide the issue. Something needs to bring the subject up and if it is an adult woman like Emma Stone the one doing it in a movie and not an actual child, better off. So feel the horror and don't ignore it when it happens in real life
@@dietotakuAre you the kind of person who comes out of Come and See thinking it's pro-war because the characters don't stare directly at the barrel of the camera and go, "This is pretty fucked up, ain't it?" 😶
@@ateneamaurtuaomg YES wholeheartedly agree to this take😮💨🙏🏻💖
this is giving me "anime girl who looks like a five year old but is actually a thousand year old god so its totally fine for fanservice"
also i love these video essay styles!! i would totally read/watch your take, it sounds so interesting and complex :O
Except it's actually the opposite, lmao - woman who looks like an adult but is actually a child, which imo, is so, so much worse
Yeah, it's literally the opposite of that, and for me highlights how ridiculous the moralizing about young looking old characters is.
When it comes down to it though isn't it just different ways for people to be pedos?@@micheal2458
This movie also shows that people will justify it when its the other way around, so the whole reasoning is flawed and people just sexualize everything
@@novadearest Yeah, but the end point is the same, it's totally cool to sexualise her. Because her mind/body is adult, that means she is adult. And therefor they're allowed to perv on her.
Which btw expands to teenage girls who "look older" according to the creeps who want to get away with catcalling and harrassing a 14 year old, or the lies predators tell young children: "you are very mature for your age".
I can't stand how many times gender flipped characters that are supposed to be traditionally unattractive and just completely remove that aspect of the character. It makes it clear that most people only view women as sex objects and not much else. I'm glad to finally hear someone other than me talking about this.
actually adam, frankenstein’s “monster” is supposed to be beautiful, it’s just his yellow eyes that are disturbing. but i get your point.
@@Me-vn3gzrly? i just read the original book and he was definitely mutilated, not just yellow eyes. where’d u get that info from? i’m curious
edit: okay ig he wasn’t like fully ugly, but he did have thin yellow skin and disproportionate and too big body parts, like victor and all the humans that saw him thought he was ugly
@@imaneclair4836 Yeah it's a bit complicated. He's beautiful, but still looks so obviously unnatural that he ALSO looks hideous. Standard horror trope really. Even the most beautiful person in the world would look scary if they were so obviously a walking corpse.
@@Me-vn3gzno the creature (his name isn’t Adam lol) is descibed as ugly by both frankenstein and walton. He was eight foot tall, disproportionated and had yellowish skin
Reminds me of women's fantasy armor
I keep coming back to this video. Your summary of what the film's plot could have been brought tears to my eyes. Well done
I love love love video essays, and thos style of video is right up my alley. Most video essay yt channels don't focus on art, so I like the combination of my two favorite kinds of videos!
i am a big fan of “what if frankenstein was a distraught lesbian” actually, i would read/watch that in a heartbeat it sounds so interesting
Is glass Scientists I think she is an old lady gay scientist, but that's a webcomic, and she's a secondary cast member. Still a great comic and portray of Frankenstein.
i second this
I know right??? I would read that sapphic novel in a heartbeat, if there was a possibility that it could be made I would beg on my knees.
Pls watch the film birth/rebirth it is Exactly what you’re looking for, just in another setting.
The director’s barely disguised fetish.
Literally infantilizing and then sexualizing said woman is not cute. This is such a gross premise.
Lavender’s version sounds infinitely better.
Ikr, it’s like the “born sexy yesterday” trope on a whole new level, I’m so disturbed.
fr... 🤮
@coffeebean_18 that's the point, it's supposed to slap you in the face with how uncomfortable that trope should make people
@@coffeebean_18the movie quite literally turns the trope on it’s head and pokes a bunch of holes in it. the man that tried to groom her ended up getting screwed over by her immaturity. please watch the film if you’re going to comment on it.
@@coffeebean_18 that's the point...
This is my first video here and I love the format so much. It’s beautiful in the way everything is presented. The horror of the movie, the salvaging of the idea, and a total rework of the intent. I would love more videos with a variety of subjects. And a variety of feelings towards the subject material! It doesn’t need to be just things that incite anger.
I love this! Your drawings evaluations of the movie and the ideas you had for it were all wonderful!
When a man makes a feminist movie, you just know it’s going to be bad😭
Yeah, that's always the first huge red flag when I hear about these kinds of stories/films.
It never goes well.
And Frankenstein is already a phenomenal story.
Especially if there's no female consultant at the very least. It's the whole, "How does a woman feel? We asked a man!" xP
@@MadAliceInWonderland exactly
There have been a couple that become cult classics for feminism, like Alien (which portrays the horror of SA and Forced Birth but towards cis men, and it legitimately caused that reaction of horror & forced empathy in many cis men) -but it is *very* interesting to note that the ones that are actually rather good are almost always horror movies and tragedies… and oftentimes *still* have issues of their own that probably would have been caught if women (especially those with the specific experiences being addressed) were more highly involved in the productions
I believe men can make feminist art, take the band nirvana as an example. But my god is it rare
i’m still in kind of the beginning of the video but it’s realllyyy weird that they wrote a bunch of men touching a woman who is actually a literal baby. that’s peak weird ash
Fr! Like, she’s mentally a child. A minor mentally but not physically. It makes me uncomfortable..
Ok yes these things happen, but what lavendertowne is rly refusing to say is these actions are never portrayed in a neutral light. They are supposed to be seen as predatory and evil😭. Plus this was never supposed to be a Mary Shelly retelling, comparing the two characters makes no sense thematically
@@StayCalm_DoArt123 literally what I said man, what abt them being ‘predatory and evil’ sounds like a neutral light to you? I said ‘these actions were never portrayed in a neutral light’ meaning - the light shone upon these men is a bad one -
@@iseeyou2211 oh sorry dude I misread, we on the same page then
I imagine it would be until you've come to understand reality like I have. Males want to have sex with women when and how they please. This is why so many have committed SA and rãpê, so very very many.
So, imagine a male being presented with a woman who has the body of a women without the ability to tell them no. "Creamed jeans" doesn't even begin to describe it.
(sorry for being crude)
Ahhhh I would love to hear your take on more stories! Either your own version of classics or rewriting those that fell flat
the pose of the last drawing is so well done and i’m so obsessed
the idea of Bella making a grave marker for her mother should absolutely have been in the film 💔
That movie sounds so gross 🤢. It’s a film about a literal child in a woman’s body being sexually abused repeatedly and it won awards?! Wtf.
Both of your ideas sound amazing though and like films I would love to see.
Honestly, your description of the film makes the plot almost sound palatable, because even that can be spun to have some sort of statement made about predatory people and the way the world views young people, girls especially. The actual plot of the movie is much worse, basically just what you described, but taken completely at face value with no critical thinking applied to it at all
@@one-onessadhalf3393 Yeah, the worst part was definitely the fact that they didn’t see it as a problem, it sounds like the repeated sexual abuse of a baby was actually celebrated as being somehow feminist 🤢
It's not supposed to be literal. I felt like you did going into it, and at the start of the film, but by the end it was my favourite film of the past year.
It's made very obvious that the film is abstract and surrealist, so it's not supposed to be literal, it's a commentary of what men do to women, and also someone who hasn't had the chance to be stained by patriarchy and misogyny, finding a place and keeping childlike wonder. It's the embodiment of the death of innocence; think of the first time we as women had to learn it wasn't safe to go into certain places without a man or by ourselves, the first time you learned that the world wasn't fair.
It's a surrealist metaphor. Please just watch the film instead of gobbling up someone else's opinion wholesale.
@@obara7366 THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR THIS COMMENT! i feel like im going insane on this comment section lol
You would NOT survive on the dead dove tag on ao3
I come back to this video so often because your thoughts and insight on film and art is so inspiring and respectful both to the original media and the characters it intended to represent
this is my third watch of this video and i love this style. its refreshing to see a new opinion on some of these popular films, especially coming from a creative person who has ideas on how they could make it better. i would love to see more video essays from you
Nitpicky as it is, I would like to note that Victor in the original novel was not a scientist or doctor. He was a college student/dropout who did the original experiment out of boredom and a want to put to use all that he had learned. He shunned his own creation because it wasn't perfect in his eyes, leading to all the tragic events of the book. Again, it's a misconception a lot of people spread, but I thought I would note it here for anyone who hadn't read the original book. You all definitely should, it's amazing. X3
I mean Victor was seeking glory, and scientific advancement above all morals, but yes I see what you mean, he was a college dropout that does not deserve to be called Doctor Frankenstein.
He was also motivated by the death of his mother.
He wasn't exactly bored, more like pretentious. And when he saw what he had done he got scared and backed away, neglecting the responsibility
A man, making a feminist retelling of a book a women wrote? That just feels so wierd and almost disrespectful tbh.
Bro it was written by a man… this was not a Frankenstein retelling. I love lavendertown but this is just not an educated rant. Bella is exploited by the men around her, thematically it’s supposed to be extremely dark.
@@iseeyou2211 I understand what your saying, but the way it was shown, to me, seemed like it was almost glorifying it. But that's just a personal opinion.
@@who7506 idk I understand where lavendertown is coming from (kind of) but I don’t believe she was able to get past the initial shock value. Every man in this film is a constraint to Bella’s freedom/exploration which later becomes symbolically grander in a patriarchal sense. Sex is the ultimate rebellion against feminine standards of the 17th century yet the men around her (even the ones she’s not romantically involved with) exploit her naivety for their own gain, not one of them is supposed to be viewed in a positive light🙄
Also ‘shown to you’ you basically spouted bs in the original comment
@@iseeyou2211 Poor Things the novel is a retelling of Frankenstein though, Mary Shelley and her book is in this film's DNA. And yeah, it is disrespectful for this to be marketed as "the feminist version" considering both the subject matter of the film itself and the origins of it being Frankenstein specifically.
@@mia-saraking5479 honestly I didn’t interpret the book as so much a ‘retelling’ of Mary Shelly’s Frankenstein, but it’s own piece of media and themes with recurring motifs from Frankenstein , in no way are the ideologies similar
I really hope you keep making videos like this- at least every now and again- it's very good and i'd like to hear your opinions on other films
Lavender I love your content but couldn’t disagree more about it not being a feminist film!! Although I agree it’s not feminist for the reasons you list. In my opinion the movie is in part a commentary on how young girls are often treated as adults due to their appearance before they are mentally adults. Teen girls are frequently groomed by older men who claim she “seemed so mature” or “looked old enough,” etc. or saying she pursued THEM, the adult who should’ve known better and stopped it, if that was even true. Throughout the movie Bella is taken advantage of in her “child state,” despite seeming to be an adult and being treated as one by everyone else, she can’t advocate for herself until she has fully matured. Her progressive development gives her a unique position as she has formed her own identity and made her own future when not subjected to the guilt and shame girls and women are conditioned to have. Every man in Bella’s life lets her down and her success is in spite of them, not because of them. This is because they are unable to manipulate or shame her into feeling guilty or ashamed of herself. The only time Bella truly feels bad about anything she does is when she herself realizes it, not because someone tried to make her feel bad. When her friend specifically hurts her, she’s not mad because she sees that he is projecting onto her. That is what every man in the film does, projects their idea of Bella onto her, and Bella rejects it at every turn.
I loved the twist at the end where we find out Victoria was a cruel person, even if a victim herself, and the assumption there is that she was shamed into embracing the cruelty of men around her. Bella can’t be shamed to do so.
I respect your interpretation and think part of why the movie is so great is because it has so many different messages depending how you look at it. There are definitely parts I had issue with as well but overall I think the point of the film was to make us all reflect more deeply on our own society and start having these conversations about what it means to be a “liberated woman,” not only in our own time but across history.
Much love to you and your channel! :)
Thank you so much for sharing your thoughts on the film! I was feeling quite similarly, and I was beginning to get discouraged as I was reading through all the comments :')
and let's not forget emma stone was a producer of this movie, so she had a lot of agency, so its not just a movie directed by a man
I know this is such a small nitpick compared to the other negative aspects of this movie but I'm really annoyed they made everyone English? The original book was written by a Glaswegian, and set in the Scottish city of Glasgow.
Even in the book, the city is a key theme as Alasdair Grey draws lines between Bella's neglect and his critiques about how the city council neglects glasgow's social and cultural history.
Also, the author is one of the most important Scottish authors in the 20th - 21st century (like he's pretty much to glasgow what Charles Dickens is to London.) He's been referred to as the "the father figure of the renaissance in Scottish literature and art". The book contains maps and doodles of real glaswegian streets, landmarks and addresses drawn by alasdair himself.
Hollywood is terrified of the Scottish accent I swear 💀💀
Such a small nitpick I know. Im throwing a fuss because I'm studying English + Scottish literature 💀💀💀💀💀 I just would have loved if they had at least mentioned the city in the film 😭😭
i didn't know it was originally meant to be set in glasgow, that would have been so cool! id like to see everyone in that cast do their best crack at a scottish accent lol
I think they were trying to draw more parallels between their movie and Frankenstein-hoping to attach themselves to something more well-known, as it were
… Which also doesn’t work, ‘cuz the story starts in Sweden (Victor, himself, being Swedish) and, although he does visit England, he *also* travels to/through Germany, France, Scotland, and the Arctic
The England-ization of classic literature (especially Gothic literature) is a plague upon the world
Hollywood is like the voice recognition elevator 💀
Wait, Mary Shelley was Glaswegian?
@@sobekmania No, they're talking about Alasdair Gray, the man who wrote the original "Poor Things" book.
This hurts even more as an autistic person it reminds me so much about how people treat us as children no matter what we do or how old we get
Same
I feel like that was one of the primary aspects of the boom too😭the “changeling” myth and a creature that seems human but “wrong,” yet has a compassionate and intelligent mind
@@montymints yea I swear most neurotypicals see us as like, an alien with no intelligence or emotion
fellow autistic person here, i totally get what you mean. some people treat us like we're whining babies and our problems aren't valid. they say they'll help, but they don't.
Oh gosh, I never thought of that. I'm autistic too. This made me even more angry now.
Your redesign ideas are SO fucking brilliant
All the other youtube vids exclaim how much they love this movie, and ignore all the probomatic themes. But now after watching your vid It finally feels like i watched the same movie! Im not crazy and it was an off putting movie, like if you're gonna have morbid and dark themes at least know how to discuss them and make an in depth take on it, not whatever shallow artsy thing poor things became
Loved your take and vid, great ideas all round!!
My face the entire time listening to you describe this movie as someone who hasn't seen it: 💀🤢🤮
I can't believe somebody actually wrote an actual movie like that.
I can't believe that it got nominated for so many awards 💀
SAME 😭 This sounds absolutely terrible and seems fetishy with literal babies brains inside grown women bodies, there is nothing feminist about this movie
Yes. I think I would have walked out too. Incredibly disturbing.
if a writer gave me this script i would wack him on the face with the script 10 times before saying "what the fuck is wrong with you?" how the hell was this approved?
DAZAI PFP?!1?11!!1
We need more Lavendertowne video essays 😤
Amen
Yes to that !
Absolutely
Agreed
Agreed
I would love to see more of these kinds of videos from you. It gives lots of life to these conversations, especially because you don’t only pick apart these topics, you offer so many creative ways to change and fix the problems in these situations.
This video made me feel so seen omg...I went to see this movie yesterday and your words "It wasn't until I started thinking about the implications and the exact events of the film that a pit started to form in my stomach" deeply represent my experience. I left the theater thinking, OH I guess this was a good movie despite the bizarre stuff going on and the focus on the explicit scenes right?? It's just ARTSY but I guess kinda empowering in a way....right?!!
Then, after thinking on it for a while, I got this deep disgust and uneasiness within myself. You did a great job explaining the story, presenting your points and important reflections to make regarding this movie. So thank you sm for this! ALSO your art is super fluid and pleasant to look at, I loved watching your proccess! PS: Your different take at the end of the video was so good omgg, I wish I saw THAT instead of what I got ToT
The beginning was quite cute so I kept forgiving every red flag showing up for a while, but it definitely started to make me uneasy when the father just agreed to marry her like she wasn’t a child at that moment. I left the theater so disappointed :(
This has got to be the most literal example of the "born sexy yesterday" trope I have ever seen, and it's even more gross than it usually is. They had a neat set up of potentially exploring how, even in the modern day, women are expected to pump out children, regardless of if that's what they actually want. Especially considering how they prioritized saving the unwanted baby's life over the life of the woman who's been forced to carry it. That the value of women's lives should revolve around children and their ability/desire to have them, but the movie couldn't do it.
I would say this is the opposite of the born sexy yesterday trope, there’s a line in the movie where Mark Ruffalos character admits he liked her better when she was more child like and Bella rejects him for that. In a true born sexy yesterday trope Bella would have fallen in love with the first man she met and let HIM show her the world. Bella is indifferent to most of the men in this film especially at the beginning. And she discovers the world on her own. This is a lot of moral panic that isn’t warranted.
A little correction about "Different Take on 'Feminist Frankenstein'".
The hunchback assistant in the first film is called Fritz. Igor is a character in one of the sequels who is blackmailing Doctor Frankenstein to use the monster for revenge on some villagers. Igor had his neck broken in an attempt to hang him, which is why audiences blend him and Fritz together in their heads.
this too is one of my biggest qualms with pop-cultures franken-takes™️
Ygor (yeah i don’t know why it’s spelled like that either) doesn’t appear until the third movie (son of frankenstein) and only ~kind of~ is a lab assistant, he’s more like the town crazy guy haha
(also fritz, while the character was a really crappy person, was played by dwight frye who’s one of my favorite actors. we need more fritz representation!! lol)
@@oddelf7988) it might be cause of "Young Frankenstein" fusing the two characters into one.
So it's really Marty Feldman we're thinking of as "Igor", not Dwight Frye or Bela Lugosi (tho of course both of them had different iconic characters)
@@steamboatwill3.367 yeah that’s very possible actually- young frankenstein is just Too Iconic lol
Thanks for the correction!!! I’m more familiar with the book than the movie so I made a mistake 🥲
@@LavenderTowne Interesting enough, Igor character doesn't exist in the book. The first 'hunchbacked' assistant appeared in a play of the book.
I LOVE all your ideas and this format, thought provoking work~!
Film student here and I fully agree. I had a hard time finding a movie review that I agree with about Poor things and I felt so alone because no one seemed to have the same opinion . Even if i tried to talk with my classmates, (everyone being super open minded and feminist etc) seem to love this film, giving me the argument that "Bella chose to have sex with all those men, so it makes it ok". No, it's not because she has the brain of a child. I felt like Im in the wrong, and I even tried to avoid sharing my opinion to avoid conflict or people thinking I have problematic opinions even thought Im very much a liberal feminist person. Thank you for talking about this film.
I have a question have you read or seen flowers for algernon? Because I wonder if it’s the same thing. Poor things imo opens this whole world of questionable things. As well I’m surprised at the rate Bella learns. I haven’t seen the movie yet but enough to know a lot of spoilers something about Frankenstein just makes me go into a deep rabbit hole. I think a chunk of it does lead to morality and rationality of things. Would Frankenstein’s monster be technically a child too even if they have an adult body?? Was Charlie from Flowers for Algernon being capable of being in a relationship before the operation? Things like that makes me just question a good chunk so it does lead back to morals vs logic.
No, I havent seen flowers of algernon, but I will check it out.
I will mention that, in my opinion, not all films have to show 100% moral stuff on the screen. TW--There is so much violence in movies and forms of abuse, murder etc and a lot of them show how fucked up is the situation, or the main character fighing agaisnt it.
Like I wouldve been ok with Bella fucking with all those men if it wouldve show me how fucked up that situation is. I felt like at some point, Poor things kinda normalizes whats happenening to Bella and forgets that Bella has the brain of the child. The comedy from the film felt sometimes for me a bit, forced and not funny ..I love dark comedys but this one felt..odd ..not to mention she ends up with the guy that wanted to marry her, fully knowing she has the brain of a child(this ending showed me that the film didnt care at all about the actual moral implications of a woman with the brain of a child making these kind of decisions, plus, he was portraied as a hero, a good guy from beginning to end).
I did hear the argument that Bella grew up fast, so it makes it ok, but I didn't really see that. Bella at some point started talking with complicated words but she wasnt talking like an adult or acting like it, and sure, she didn't know how to act in the world around her but if they wanted to show me she is an adult now, making her say elevated words and still acting like a 8 year old, is not the way to go. Like the way I saw it it was more of a child that leanred a lot of new words. Let's say I interpreted wrong and she was an adult towards the second half of the film. She clearly didn't have the understanding of how prostitution works for example. She can't know. So the argument 'she is an adult now, it should be ok ' doesn't stand because in the real world, to be an adult means (at least) 18 years of experiences and going through life and she doesn't have that. So theoretically, even if she is an adult, it still doesn't make it ok. Being an adult is relative in this situation. Does it matter that her brain developed fast enough to make all these things ok? (No) because she doesn't know anything about the world anyway.
Again, I would've been ok with all of these, if they would've aproach it and executed the film differently.
And Theoretically, Frankestein's monster wasn't a kid because all those parts of him were from adult bodies including the brain. The monster was acting a bit odd at first, having troubles to walk and being agressive because he just woke up from the dead( trying to use all his body parts that were belonging to different people) I don't think its the same.
I feel so disappointed by this film... men just love to write characters sleeping with multiple people while being either gaslighted/manipulated/under the born yesterday trope while calling it "liberating" and "feminist"
I'm so pissed up
I don't know if you'll see this, but you are genuinely oine of the main reasons I'm still an artist
art block sucks, but certain artists have that power to just pull you straight out with motivation - and you're one of those artists for me
so thank you so much for all of your content and thank you for inspiring 2 million artists, including me :)
I really loved the video, and your ideas are awesome, really makes me think about the possibilities. ❤❤❤
This made me think through some of my books, especially my favourite/s.
Hyde by Antje Wagner (I've never gotten around to reading the original), the main character of this story is a young woman, which we don't know too much about at the start of the story. This author likes to play with the timeline of her stories and character perspectives. In Hyde she jumps between the present and the past, and as our protagonist, Katrina, continues on her path in the present, we get glimpses of her past, from her childhood up until to almost the beginning of the book in the present.
I still remember how clueless I was, when I first read the book. I understood that she had a weak left leg and it was therefore a pain for her to walk around in those heels. I understood that she was a carpenter and had a certain love for everything wood and the beauty of buildings. I also understood that she covered the lower half of her face and had difficulties speaking, found it straining.
But I didn't know the reasons for any of it. In the present we always just see her in a panic at the prospect of someone seeing her face, going to some odd measures, such as drinking a normal hot coffee with a straw. It's not the main focus of the story, but she does get portraied as a monster by many around her.
She is a strong character, who is so grounded in the beliefes she grew up with that she has a hard time finding a new place in the world after losing her home, Hyde. She is no perfect being, she did commit some crimes, she has a good package of trauma. She knows love, knows what it means to lose those she loves.
It's a story I hold close to my heart.
I apologize, if this got anyone interested, as far as I know this book is only available in german..
Ahh I'm glad to be German then! I'm more than interested, thanks
@@desonyli That’s a surprise for me!
I hope I didn't spoil too much.. the facts I mentioned can all be found within the first to second chapter. The general things are more of a final observation.
What may be good to know is that it is a novel, it plays in a world close to ours (no fantasy world), however it does include some fantastic elements.
Also, something that is rather important for me is how the book ends. Good ending or bad one? Open or closed? This book would have a good closed ending.
So, the worst part of this is that this is a literal example of how many women are treated in the media, being innocent, having no agency, infantilizing, However, it was even more extreme, including disgusting scenes to attract creeps.
The movie shows Bella growing up mentally and yet critiques like this one act like she was still in the baby stage through the whole story.
Isn't THAT your example of infantilization?
@@VixxKong2to be clear, i haven’t seen the film.
but the critique in this video is that the way her “sexual liberation” is treated doesn’t mix with the “she’s a baby in an adult body! learning to grow up!!” storyline at all. she’s just taken advantage of several times in the beginning and that’s never explored in the depth such a serious topic deserved to be.
again idk if it’s fully accurate but at least argue against the real criticism if you’re gonna defend the film
@@daizy7441
That's the problem. She starts as a baby and she grows up. By the time she leaves the house and starts having smexx she was already in the "young adult independence" stage of growing up. They literally say it in the movie. We spend at least 30 minutes with 2 scientists documenting her mental growth.
Of course you wouldn't know that because the people who hate the movie are willingly hiding this information from their reviews in order to paint a narrative around the authors. It's not the first time that Lavandertown is calling other authors perverts over their female characters.
Also, Bella says to her first lover that she has smexx because she likes it and she sees no reason to be limiting herself to being with only 1 person. And tbh I enjoy that more than the idea that if a woman has smexx then she is by default being exploited because men enjoy that too.
It's a real problem to me that smexx is almost always seen as the dominance of men over women. Because I'm pretty sure that even without the scifi premise of a baby's brain in a woman's body, people would still hate the smexx scenes.
@@VixxKong2 ) - where has she done that?
- that's a weak excuse.
@@steamboatwill3.367
Where did who done what?
Note: It isn’t based on Frankenstein. The media found that the easiest comparison to make, so they ran with it.
It’s based off a book that was based off of Frankenstein though
if the original book has inspiration and enough parallels to Frankenstein, the comparison is fair and warranted.
@@iliasbeeDepends, if you would also be ok if the 50 Shades of Gray movie back then would constantly be compared to twilight instead of the 50SoG book just because it is inspired by twilight.
@@Oiami-.-if it proclaimed to be a feminist retelling I don’t see why it couldn’t
@@Oiami-.- i get what youre trying to say but the 2nd and 3rd movies in the 50sog franchise were based on the second and third twilight movies pretty heavily.
oh my gosh thank you for this video I'm going a little crazy that so many people love this movie you explained everything so perfectly
I really like this new style of video! I have not watched in a while as some of the more click-baity videos are fun but have not appealed. I was also curious about this movie and have debated watching, but this was much better
So how is your film feminist?
"Uh, it features a hot lady who doesn't like things happening to her and she wins at the end, sorta"
...
ALL THE AWARDS!!
as a greek, i can confirm that the vast majority of ppl in my country don't like Lanthimos as a director in general. I saw the film with my friends and other than the costumes and the general aesthetic we didn't like anything else. The film is overhyped
I really loved the video essay/drawing format!!!!!!
love the format and your new story pitch, I would 100% go watch that
I still haven't gotten over the part where the men would ask "where the softest spot of her body was" to sexually exploit her. I am actually in disgust. The whole entire video and i keep thinking back on that and "ick-ing" if that even is a word.
I was going to go see this movie a few days ago with my sister and our respite worker. But since it had a 15+ rating We decided to check it for my PTSD triggers online. Holy Crap. It had Every Single One of my Triggers, Like the writers had a damn check list or something! We had to tell our respite worker there was NO WAY I could watch this movie. We went to the beach instead (we live in Australia).
Possibly the best decision of your life
Good for you! I'm glad I didn't end up seeing this movie either. I hope you had fun at the beach!
good decision as im hearing, i hope the beach was fun!
This is exactly how I felt. Thank you!
I saw someone compare this movie to Barbie and said it’s ‘Barbie for adults’ but the more I hear about this movie the more I think that’s wrong. Barbie actually had something to say about the patriarchy, exploitation of women and motherhood. It feels like this movie is interested in her sex life than her.
Overall love your video and rewrite. You’re so right, we deserve a real gender swap Frankenstein movie, and your art is so pretty! Instant subscribe!! 💕💕💕
can I just say your Bella redesign is so endearing, and we definitely need more actually disturbing, "disgusting" looking women on screen. or literally even just disabled women
okay but now I'm angry we don't have a queer/feminist/pro-disability retelling of Frankenstein about an outcast finding her place in a family of outcasts
It's not exactly the same, but many of the works of Osamu Tezuka have similar themes. A lot of his protagonists (Astro boy, Hakimaru, Black Jack) are literally built or remade in some way. Black Jack is the only story I've read in depth, but it talks about feminism, medical ethics and consent, racism, environmentalism, the nature of disability, and more. There's even a character who would probably identify as a trans man if the story was written today. These works were made in the 70's and 80's so there are some things that haven't aged ideally- but I highly recommend them if you're looking for the kind of themes Lavender talk about in her last idea section.
it would be so silly if i said frankie stein from monster high rn
@@c4ndybutt0ns No no, you're right. Especially the most recent (g3) version, who uses they/them and has a prosthetic leg that the designers aren't shy about showing. I only know monster high peripherally, through watching a doll youtuber, but I bet there are people who ship Frankie with one of the other girls.
@@katelynna10000 I've been summoned. I ship frankie with everyone because I just want to see them happy! And all the ghouls are so lovely!!
Although, I watched the live action film for gen 3 and I wouldn't be comfortable shipping them at this time because of the whole "born (sexy?) yesterday" thing haha! But you know... a couple decades down the line, for sure I'm shipping.
As a gender confused disabled person, Frankie is an icon and I love them. Gen2 Frankie was my first doll as an adult collector too so they really kickstarted my journey into healing my inner child lol, as cringy as I sounds.
Also, frankie is literally multiple people stitched together with their knowledge in their head - of course their pronouns are they/them!! That's like THE MOST "frankenstein's monster" thing you could do😂😂😂
@@katelynna10000 i think in the g3 show there is a bit of a hinted romance between frankie and cleo yeah?? i haven’t watched much of it yet tho so it might just be fan theory / shipping i’ve heard about lol
Beautifully well done and well said! Keep making videos like these!
I love the comparison to Inara from Firefly!! Such a great point, I never would’ve thought of this :)
It is so infuriating how poor things is being praised as "feminist", while it continues to fit perfectly into the male gaze. I loved the video essay format looking forward if you create more :3
boy oh boy I sure do love when a man takes a story a woman wrote based on her own life experiences, twists it into the opposite of everything it was meant to represent and calls his version the "more feminist" one
Bro it’s not a retelling of Frankenstein goofy. You probably haven’t even watched the film you’re just reiterating everything this UA-camr says because you’re not ready to get your own opinion
@@joemama8595 The novel Poor Things does indeed take inspiration from Frankenstein
@@helixxia9320 so the movie that took inspiration from a book which took inspiration from another book is taking things from the original book??? Go after the author not the director lmao
@helixxia9320
Yeah just like most vampire stories are inspired by Bram Stocker's Dracula.
That doesn't mean that Twilight is a female retelling of a man's story
i really like this analysis, good job!
thank you for your changes so much. i really wish more had your ideas
I was really interested in this movie when I first heard about it, and then I found out it was literally a BABY walking around in a fully developed adult body having sex with ACTUAL ADULTS WHY DID ANYONE THINK THAT WAS A GOOD IDEA??? WHO GREENLIT THIS????????
THANK YOU! My mom and I saw this movie on Christmas together while I was in town, and left the theater having an hour long rant about how misogynistic and disgusting this film was. I genuinely don't think a single a woman was in the writing room here.
Internalized mysoginy exists too
It's not the film that was misogynistic, but the men in the film.
Maybe the director should put out a version where he cuts off all the smexx scenes, like that people would actually pay attention to the whole movie
@@VixxKong2 how old are you when you write sex as smex the movie isn't really for me either but i dont think youre old enough to understand the point of poor things if you just cut out all the sex scenes it's literally about a woman's sexual liberation
@@skmt-lm8vk
I write it like that because I sometimes get my comments deleted by UA-cam without it.
I would be such an insane fan of the version of the story you created in the last (not counting summary) part omggg
I honestly couldn't WAIT to watch this movie. All the hipe and it looked so neat! Though when it ended something definitely didn't feel right, but i couldn't pin point it. Ive been waiting to watch this vid as to avoid spoilers, but i ran STRAIGHT to it and IM SO GLAD I DID. Thank you for all of these opinions because they really did open my eyes. Love this vid, hate there were so many sex scenes, and you're AMAZING!
Found someone basically saying it's the opposite of loli. It so damn accurate 🤢