What's In It
Based on the actual screenplayViolenceExtreme▼
LanguageExtreme▼
Scary ScenesExtreme▼
RomanceExtreme▼
SubstancesModerate▼
StimulationExtreme▼
Despite being marketed and received as a whimsical arthouse fairy tale, the film contains a scene in which a doctor clinically describes a female genital mutilation procedure using a surgical device as a planned punishment for Bella — this is the film's darkest and most viscerally disturbing moment, and parents who are themselves survivors of sexual violence or FGM should be specifically forewarned.
About Poor Things
Poor Things is a darkly comic Victorian fantasy following Bella Baxter, a woman whose dead body was surgically reanimated by scientist Godwin Baxter — who transplanted the brain of an aborted baby into her corpse — and who proceeds to experience the world with the unconstrained curiosity of a child in an adult body. As Bella escapes Baxter's control and travels from London to Lisbon to Paris, she discovers sex, poverty, philosophy, and her own fierce autonomy, eventually choosing to become a doctor. The film is a surreal, visually extravagant, and deeply explicit exploration of female agency, bodily autonomy, and self-determination, told with grotesque humour and unflinching adult content.
Family Takeaways from Poor Things
What it gets right
- ✓The film powerfully dramatises the danger of men controlling women's bodies and lives — Alfie's threat of female genital mutilation is presented as the film's clearest moral horror, and Bella's escape from it is genuinely triumphant.
- ✓Bella's choice to become a doctor — rejecting a life defined by others' desires in favour of meaningful work — is a rich portrait of how personal suffering can be transformed into social purpose.
Poor Things Cultural & Values Guide
Cultural & Values Guide
Bella's sexual journey explicitly includes relationships with both men and women, with her bisexuality being a clear part of her exploration of human experience and desire.
Community Notes
- Some feminist critics have debated whether the film's extended and explicit depiction of Bella's work as a prostitute — however framed as her autonomous choice — reproduces the male gaze it claims to subvert, given that the film was directed by a man (Yorgos Lanthimos) and written by a male screenwriter (Tony McNamara) adapting a male author (Alasdair Gray).
- The portrayal of Alfie's threat of female genital mutilation has been flagged by some advocacy groups as risking trivialisation of a real-world harm experienced by millions of women, particularly given the film's broadly surreal and comedic register.
Is Poor Things Appropriate for Your Child's Age?
Individual children may vary — use your judgment.
Parents also ask about Poor Things
- Is Poor Things appropriate for a 18-year-old?
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