THERE’S a new quirk fest in cinemas this week. A parade of spectacular nonsense from the maestro behind all of your favourite weird films.

Yes, Poor Things is the latest oddity from The Lobster and The Killing of a Sacred Deer director Yorgos Lanthimos. It’s another delectable slice of the peculiar from the man who does peculiar best. Hooray to that.

Lanthimos is an actor’s director. They can’t get enough of him. It’s something about his approach and the opportunity he grants actors to let rip. Having ensnared Emma Stone into his warped world for 2018’s The Favourite, Poor Things finds her back for more. And who can blame her? It’s the juiciest of juicy roles.

Stone plays the rather wonderfully named Bella Baxter. She’s a curio from the laboratory of Willem Dafoe’s disfigured and slightly unhinged Godwin Baxter, a surgeon in 19th-century London. While her body is that of one Victoria Blessington, Bella has the brain of a very young child.

Specifically - here’s where we deep dive into the weird - Bella has the brain of Victoria’s own baby, extracted from her own dead body following a tragic act of suicidal intent. Don’t say you weren’t warned. Believe it or not, this one’s a comedy.

Poor Things derives from Alasdair Gray’s eponymous - Whitbread award-winning - novel of 1992 but owes obvious debt to Mary Shelley’s own Frankenstein. Think of it as a more modern, modern Prometheus; one dense with themes of social inequality, identity and gender critique but less Scottish than the original book.

Alongside Stone and Defoe, Marvel’s Mark Ruffalo plays Duncan Wedderburn, a lawyer with whom Bella explores the world. There’s much to see and more to learn. Expect rampant hedonism en route.

There are roles too for stand-up comedian Ramy Youssef, First Man’s Christopher Abbott and the ever-remarkable Kathryn Hunter.

Poor Things is as fiercely funny and dizzily imaginative as cinema can be. Stone dazzles, astonishing from open to close. The film will feature heavily in the coming awards season chatter. As you read this, Stone has already snapped up a Golden Globe. The Oscar all but has her name on it.

Splendidly steampunk aesthetics make for an attractive backdrop, while Jerskin Fendrix delivers an unsettlingly percussive soundtrack for his feature debut. It’s a little on the racy side, be warned, but terrific fun.