This may not be the film to watch with your parents, nor if you dislike it every time someone takes their clothes off in a movie. But this stunning adult fairy tale by director Yorgos Lanthimos has Emma Stone giving a virtuosic performance in one of the best films of 2023.

Yes, 2023. Technically, the buzzed-about film first saw releases stretching back to its September Venice Film Festival premier through its limited release stateside in December.

Well, Central Oregon film fans can rejoice: The weirdly wonderful movie that has been piling on awards, most recently getting 11 Oscar nominations, has reached our snow, ice and slush-filled world.

Lanthimos has never been shy when it comes to nudity or sex in his films, but “Poor Things” might be the most. There’s a growing movement by younger movie fans to nix spicy scenes altogether in a kind of harking back to the Hays Code of old, but here, these scenes are necessary to tell the story of Bella Baxter (Stone). They intertwine completely with her arc of self-discovery and assurance and juxtapose the Victorian society she is placed in.

Tony McNamara’s adaptation of Alasdair Gray’s novel of the same name focuses on Bella, a recently reanimated woman thanks to the work of brilliant and experimental Scottish scientist Dr. Godwin Baxter (Willem Dafoe). At the start, she lacks most verbal and motor skills of a woman in her supposed 30s, and when Godwin — or God as Bella shortens it— brings in one of his med students, Max McCandles (Ramy Youssef), to observe and note her progress, her development progresses quickly.

Eventually, Bella discovers her sexual urges, understanding it as a way to make herself instantly happy while Max pleads with her that that kind of thing is not done in polite society. But Bella eventually catches the eye of sleaze bucket Duncan Wedderburn (Mark Ruffalo), who promises to sneak her away to Lisbon, where they can be debauched all they want. And she does. It feels good. Why not do it?

Marathon lovemaking sessions and Wedderburn’s arrogant buffoonery aside, Bella adventures on her own exploring the lush city and its highs and lows.

But her horndog beau becomes jealous of her daring to experience life outside of their hotel room, so he whisks her onto a ship, attempting to limit who she sees and what she can do.

But Bella’s free spirit is not easily bound, and she continues to grow and learn from those around her and about the world at large, thwarting the attempts to make her a kept woman at every turn and being authentically herself throughout it all.

Lanthimos hones in on the objectification of Bella and the three attempts by men to lay claim to her, but Bella will not be claimed by anyone. Between his expert direction and Stone’s bold choices, Bella comes to vivid life unlike many we’ve seen before.

She is persistently curious, seeing the world at first in black and white, then in color and in all its dreamy glory. However, it is soon rendered more real, less fantastical and more practical as she comes to understand that world more.

These changes are maneuvered beautifully by the production designers Shona Heath and James Price and equally by cinematographer Robbie Ryan, who is one of the few who can use a fisheye lens effectively without causing motion sickness.

Every casting choice is fantastic. Even Ruffalo’s ever-changing British accent — accent on “ish” — works for his character.

This isn’t the first time Lanthimos and Stone have worked together in such symbiotic excellence and it likely won’t be the last, with the former seeming to know exactly how to make his star shine, no matter the film’s subject.

The tone of “Poor Things” may not be to everyone’s taste, but it showcases a masterful performance from Stone, a sharp script from McNamara and masterful direction from Lanthimos that won’t be forgotten easily.

“Poor Things”

141 minutes

Rated R for strong and pervasive sexual content, graphic nudity, disturbing material, gore and language.

Four out of four stars