Sightlines · reception
How Poor Things was received
2023 · Yorgos Lanthimos · Poor Things on Sightlines
The arc
Premiered at Venice 2023 and took the Golden Lion, then rode an awards wave to 11 Oscar nominations and 4 wins — but audiences were split from day one, and it's settled in as Lanthimos's mainstream breakthrough that people still argue about rather than a consensus classic.
What’s debated
The forever-debate: is Bella Baxter's journey a genuinely liberating feminist odyssey, or a male director's and screenwriter's fantasy of female sexual awakening wearing feminist clothes?
Its footprint
Bella Baxter escaped the film — the giant-sleeved costumes became a Halloween and fashion reference point, Emma Stone's spasmodic ballroom dance turned into an instantly recognizable GIF, and 'furious jumping' entered the Letterboxd-review lexicon.
Where it stands
A Letterboxd juggernaut — one of the platform's most-logged and most-reviewed films of the 2020s, and the film that turned Lanthimos from arthouse cult figure into a name-brand director for a new generation.
Did you know? Nothing was shot on location: the entire world — Lisbon, the steamship, the painted skies — was built on Budapest soundstages, with LED-wall oceans, in Lanthimos's deliberate throwback to 1940s Hollywood studio filmmaking.
Named by the director
- And the Ship Sails On (1983) — Lanthimos gave Fellini's studio-bound ocean-liner film to screenwriter Tony McNamara as a key reference for the film's artificial world.
- Belle de Jour (1967) — Buñuel's film was another reference Lanthimos handed McNamara while shaping the script.
- Young Frankenstein (1974) — Lanthimos cited Mel Brooks's mad-science comedy as a touchstone for the film's tone.
- Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger — Lanthimos pointed to their old-school studio craft — painted backdrops and soundstage artifice — as a model for the film's look.
- Rainer Werner Fassbinder — Lanthimos cited Fassbinder as an influence on the film's camera work.