1. The Favourite (2018)
Yorgos Lanthimos’ previous film before Poor Things shares many similarities – a darkly comedic tone, lush period costumes and production design, and a story centered around complex, morally ambiguous female characters. Set in 18th century England, it follows the power struggles and sexual politics between two cousins (played by Rachel Weisz and Emma Stone) vying to be the court favorite of the unstable Queen Anne (Olivia Colman in an Oscar-winning performance). Like Poor Things, it gleefully subverts period drama conventions with Lanthimos’ signature absurdist and surreal touches.
2. The Lobster (2015)
Another Yorgos Lanthimos film, The Lobster takes place in a dystopian near future where single people are taken to a hotel and given 45 days to find a romantic partner, or else they are transformed into an animal of their choice. It’s a bizarre, hilarious, and ultimately quite moving meditation on love, loneliness, and societal pressure to couple up. Colin Farrell and Rachel Weisz star as two awkward singletons who form a forbidden bond. The Lobster establishes many of Lanthimos’ recurring themes and motifs that carry through to Poor Things.
3. Dogtooth (2009)
Lanthimos’ breakout film is perhaps his most disturbing and provocative. In Dogtooth, a couple keeps their adult children imprisoned within their isolated compound and completely sheltered from the outside world. The kids have warped understandings of language and reality based on their parents’ lies and manipulations. When one of them starts to rebel, the facade begins to crack. It’s an unsettling exploration of power dynamics within families and the dangers of unchecked parental authority. While not as overtly comedic as Lanthimos’ later work, Dogtooth establishes his gift for mining dark humor out of twisted scenarios.
4. The Killing of a Sacred Deer (2017)
Lanthimos reteams with Colin Farrell for this unnerving psychological thriller loosely based on a Greek tragedy. Farrell plays a surgeon who takes a mysterious teenage boy under his wing, but the boy soon insinuates himself into the doctor’s family life in increasingly sinister ways. It builds an almost unbearable sense of dread as the characters are forced into a sadistic moral dilemma. Like Poor Things, it grapples with weighty themes of guilt, responsibility, and the consequences of playing God.
5. Alps (2011)
One of Lanthimos’ lesser-known early films, Alps follows a secret society that offers a unique service – members will act as surrogates for the recently deceased to help their clients process their grief. But as the members get more involved in their assumed identities, the lines between performance and reality start to blur. It’s a chilly, cerebral drama that questions notions of identity, empathy, and the roles we play for others. Like Poor Things, it features a protagonist who takes on a new persona and navigates fraught emotional terrain.
6. Frankenstein (1931)
The most famous adaptation of Mary Shelley’s classic gothic novel, which Poor Things playfully riffs on. Directed by James Whale, this iconic horror film brings the tragic tale of Dr. Frankenstein and his misunderstood monster to vivid life with groundbreaking makeup and special effects. Boris Karloff gives a legendary performance as the monster, imbuing him with both menace and poignant humanity. Like Bella Baxter in Poor Things, he is an unnatural creation struggling to find his place in a world that fears and rejects him.
7. Bride of Frankenstein (1935)
James Whale’s sequel to Frankenstein is considered by many to be even better than the original. It deepens the themes of monstrosity, loneliness, and the search for companionship. This time, Dr. Frankenstein is coerced into creating a mate for his monster, resulting in the iconic scene of Elsa Lanchester’s wild-haired, shrieking “Bride.” Her tragic fate parallels that of Bella Baxter in some ways. Bride of Frankenstein is a rare sequel that enriches and expands on its predecessor’s ideas.
8. Edward Scissorhands (1990)
Tim Burton’s modern fairy tale centers on an artificial man (Johnny Depp) with scissors for hands, created by a mad scientist but left unfinished. When he is taken in by a kind suburban family, he falls in love with their teenage daughter (Winona Ryder) but struggles to fit into their picturesque neighborhood. Like Bella Baxter, Edward is a gentle soul in a strange body, an outsider who longs for acceptance and human connection. Burton’s signature blend of whimsy, romance, and melancholy is a perfect match for this material.
9. The Elephant Man (1980)
David Lynch’s poignant biopic tells the true story of Joseph Merrick, a severely deformed man in Victorian London who is exhibited in freak shows until a kind doctor (Anthony Hopkins) takes him under his care. Like Poor Things, it grapples with questions of exploitation vs. empathy for society’s “outcasts” and explores the humanity beneath a monstrous exterior. John Hurt gives a heartbreaking performance under layers of prosthetic makeup. It’s one of Lynch’s most emotional and accessible films.
10. Coraline (2009)
This stop-motion animated dark fantasy, based on Neil Gaiman’s novella, follows a young girl who discovers an idealized parallel version of her unhappy home life, complete with attentive, doting parents. But she soon learns this other world hides sinister secrets. Like Poor Things, it’s a twisted coming-of-age story with gothic touches and a plucky female protagonist. The craft and imagination of the animation is astounding, creating a fully realized and unsettling alternate reality.
11. The Lighthouse (2019)
Robert Eggers’ hallucinatory period piece traps two lighthouse keepers (Willem Dafoe and Robert Pattinson) on a remote New England island in the 1890s as their sanity slowly unravels. Shot in stark black and white, it’s a claustrophobic descent into madness, mixing dark humor with Lovecraftian dread. Like Poor Things, it creates an immersive, otherworldly atmosphere while still anchored by two knockout performances. Dafoe in particular is a force of nature, with his salty sea dog accent and wild-eyed intensity.
12. Natural Born Killers (1994)
Oliver Stone’s notorious, hugely controversial crime satire follows a pair of mass murderers who become media sensations and folk heroes. Starring Woody Harrelson and Juliette Lewis as the psychopathic lovebirds Mickey and Mallory, it’s a lurid, hyperviolent, endlessly stylized assault on the senses. Like Poor Things, it uses shock value and pitch-black humor to offer a skewed mirror of our society’s most rotten impulses. Not for the faint of heart, but a powerful provocation in the hands of a master filmmaker.
13. Eraserhead (1977)
David Lynch’s nightmarish feature debut is a surreal, lo-fi body horror film soaked in existential dread. Jack Nance stars as a doughy, anxious everyman saddled with a monstrous, vaguely reptilian infant that won’t stop crying. The industrial wasteland setting and droning soundtrack create an intensely unsettling mood as Nance’s character struggles with fatherhood and his own deteriorating mental state. Like Poor Things, it grapples with fears around procreation and responsibility through a dark surrealist lens. It remains one of Lynch’s most inscrutable and disturbing visions.
14. Delicatessen (1991)
Before Amelie, director Jean-Pierre Jeunet made his mark with this twisted post-apocalyptic comedy set in a crumbling apartment building above a butcher shop. The butcher lures in unsuspecting victims to be slaughtered for food, until his daughter falls for the latest potential meal. With its grimy, green-tinged color palette and oddball characters, Delicatessen creates an immersive dystopian world with a morbid sense of humor. Like Poor Things, it wrings uncomfortable laughs out of taboo subject matter while still maintaining a sense of whimsy and romance.
15. Taxidermia (2006)
Hungarian director György Pálfi’s grotesque anthology film tells three stories across three generations of men in a single family – a sexually frustrated soldier, a competitive eater, and a taxidermist. The connective tissue (pun intended) is an obsession with the functions and failures of the human body, whether through sex, gluttony, or preservation of corpses. With its unflinching depictions of bodily fluids and flesh and its deadpan absurdism, Taxidermia is certainly not for the squeamish. But like Poor Things, it finds a strange, skewed beauty in the visceral messiness of biology. It’s a one-of-a-kind cinematic endurance test.
So there you have it – 15 films to satisfy your craving for more of Poor Things’ signature blend of the macabre and the mirthful, the cerebral and the visceral, the subversive and the sublime. From Yorgos Lanthimos’ other warped visions to gothic horror classics to surreal arthouse provocations, these movies prove the enduring allure of stories that poke at society’s raw nerves and expose the squirming discomfort beneath the surface. They may not be for everyone, but for those with adventurous tastes and strong stomachs, they offer a twisted feast for the senses and the psyche.
