REINTERPRETING THE FRANKENSTEIN MYTH IN YORGOS LANTHIMOS’ POOR THINGS (2023)
REINTERPRETING THE FRANKENSTEIN MYTH IN YORGOS LANTHIMOS’ POOR THINGS (2023)

Summary/Abstract: While in Mary Shelley’s novel the monstrous focuses on the creator-creation duo, Yorgos Lanthimos’ film adaptation of Alasdair Gray’s 1992 book is a multi-layered reinterpretation of the Frankenstein myth. The movie, I contend, surpasses the expected ethical implications of the misuse of science and delves into its ramifications into issues of gender, an aspect made particularly relevant by the transformation of the repulsive monster in the original story into a beautiful young woman. Just as in Shelley’s 1818 narrative Frankenstein’s creature is spat into the world hapless and pure, forced into exploring it alone, Bella Baxter shares a similar birthing. The characters’ respective points of departure, however, bear significant distinctions: abandoned, Frankenstein’s monster is forced to be an outcast and a drifter, while Bella, rescued by a scientist, decides to explore the world of her own volition. This journey from innocence to experience serves as a canvas onto which the main issues of society are depicted, representing a foil to the character development of the poor things in the story. If Victor Frankenstein fails to realise that the bestowing of life extends beyond the body, requiring emotional and psychological labour, the surgeon Godwin Baxter– a victim who surprisingly bears no grudge towards his abuser - is a rescuer and healer of such stunted creatures. In the film, science can destroy, but it can also heal. In the wake of generational trauma (Wu, AJ, 2024) as conspicuous as the scars on Godwin Baxter’s body, both the mad scientist and the creature trope are reworked in the film as shattered beings capable of healing. By comparing the Frankenstein myth with Lanthimos’ film, this paper argues that this stock character of gothic fiction, the mad scientist, is reworked to have redemptive qualities, breaking away from stereotypical representations.

• Details
• Contents