A good movie

To be honest, I wasn’t really sure what to expect from this flick but, since I kept hearing some really good things about it, I was really eager to check it out. Well, visually speaking, it was definitely Yorgos Lanthimos's most ambitious movie so far, in fact, you can probably say that it was his most ambitious movie in general. Indeed, it turned out to be some kind of weird and messed up Frankenstein tale and most of it was actually quite fascinating to behold. It actually reminded me of 'Beau is Afraid', another movie also released in 2023, in the sense that both movies were some relentless feverish nightmares. However, the big difference was that, in 'Beau is Afraid', the main character was a pathetic loser who will never find any solace or redemption in our merciless world while, in this movie, the main character actually evolved and, even though she also had to face some incredible odds and hardship, she did actually enjoy herself with the occasional pastry or some good old amazing sex which was obviously much more satisfying to behold. Eventually, the only thing that bothered me was the fact that I do think that Lanthimos's approach did tend to be rather misogynistic. Basically, for a woman, to become who ever she wants to be, it seems that the only way is going through some serious degradation. It was above all obvious during the Paris episode during which Bella became a prostitute. I mean, she had already been treated as a sex doll by Duncan Wedderburn, was it really necessary that she had sex with countless of men without her consent and basically having her being violated over and over again during the process just because it might be after all, somehow, a 'valuable' experience? To be honest, they slightly lost me at this point and I'm afraid it did prevent this movie from becoming really great. However, a part from that, it was quite an incredible ride and I shouldn't forget to mention the cast. Indeed, Willem Dafoe was, as usual, pretty much pitch-perfect but I wouldn't expect less from him. Mark Ruffalo was also  great and probably delivered here his best performance so far. However, everybody got pretty much upstaged by Emma Stone though. Indeed, what she did in this movie was quite incredible as she played a woman who was constantly evolving scene after scene and, yet, I was still convinced that it was the same woman. Basically, she was just mind-blowing. Anyway, to conclude, as usual with this director, it turned out to be quite a challenging movie but I really liked it and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you are interested in Yorgos Lanthimos's work.

7/10