Yorgos Lanthimos to torture poor things Mark Ruffalo, Emma Stone, Willem Dafoe in Frankenstein "re-imagining"

Following up on the 2018 Oscar-nominated, The Favourite, Yorgos Lanthimos is enlisting fresh souls to bring his to next unflinching on-screen exploration of love and control, Poor Things. An adaptation of the novel by Scottish author Alasdair Gray, Poor Things is a “re-imagining of Frankenstein,” which replaces Frankenstein’s monster with a young woman named Bella Baxter. Lanthimos’ Favourite star Emma Stone will play Baxter, who we assume will go around correcting people who mistakenly call her “Frankenstein” instead of “Frankenstein’s girlfriend.” As Google Books describes, the character is “a beautiful young erotomaniac brought back to life with the brain of an infant.” You had us at “erotomaniac.”

Joining the director, in what will surely be an easy watch that marries the depravity of humanity with a cool comedic touch, will be Mark Ruffalo. Ruffalo is no stranger to reworkings of 19th-century horror, having played Bruce Banner and the Hulk for the last decade or so. Also recently cast is a very welcome Willem Dafoe, who, much like Ruffalo, is no stranger to reworkings of 19th-century horror, having been Willem Dafoe his whole life.

The book captures the epistolatory format of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, told from the perspective of faux historical papers that describe Baxter’s mysterious past. The Favourite screenwriter Tony McNamara is adapting the book that Fox Searchlight describes as “a Victorian tale of love, discovery and scientific daring. Poor Things tells the incredible story of Belle Baxter, a young woman brought back to life by an eccentric but brilliant scientist.” “Incredible story” is really underselling things since we’re talking about a resurrected “erotomaniac” with a baby brain, but we’ll let it slide.