Two conspiracy nuts kidnap a woman CEO in the belief that she’s one of a group of extraterrestrials sent to destroy the planet.
I missed seeing Bugonia, the latest film from Greek director Yorgos Lanthimos, when it was playing in theaters. I was a bit wary after being disappointed by his big spectacle Poor Things a few years ago, but I finally caught up recently and was unexpectedly taken with it. Lanthimos’s radical absurdist style caught on in Hollywood, yet he’s remained thoroughly nonconformist, using weird unsettling humor to draw painful conclusions about human nature.
Bugonia feels different in a way, even though it stars Emma Stone again, and Jesse Plemmons, who was in Kinds of Kindness, another bleak item in the director’s catalog. With Bugonia, Lanthimos kind of stumbled into the project, which was supposed to be directed by Korean filmmaker Jang Joon-hwan as a remake of his 2003 film Save the Green Planet! which I haven’t seen, but had great reviews. Ill health forced Jang to step aside, with Lanthimos agreeing to take over. The story is more linear and focused than usual with him, at least until the bizarre ending.
Jesse Plemmons plays a slovenly beekeeper and conspiracy theorist named Teddy, who has a weird look in his eyes like a true believer in religious cults. He’s enlisted his mentally disabled cousin Don, played by a young autistic actor named Aidan Delbis, in a crusade to save the planet from creatures that originated in the Andromeda Galaxy, and who are responsible for our current social and environmental degradation. Teddy and Don live like hermits in a house in the country that Teddy has inherited from his mother who is comatose in a nearby hospice. We first meet them training for their cosmic mission, running and exercising together.
Teddy works in a factory run by a driven, abrasive CEO named Michelle Fuller, and played by Emma Stone. Michelle spouts a sort of New Age style corporate psychobabble, and she’s clearly an arrogant narcissist of the purest order. Teddy has become convinced that Michelle is actually one of the occupying Andromedan aliens. He and his cousin abduct her using knockout drugs, shave her head because Teddy says the hair gives her power, and tie up her up in their basement, demanding that she take them to her mother ship where they can confront the alien emperor in order to save humanity.
The screenplay is by the talented comedy writer Will Tracy, and the dialogue is darkly funny, while also managing to be genuinely appalling. Lanthimos focuses on Teddy’s dedication and utter conviction rather than how silly his beliefs happen to be. The picture becomes a cat-and-mouse struggle between Teddy and Michelle, who is very clever and manipulative in her attempts to free herself. The picture draws us into this bizarre isolated conspiracy mindset effectively, until the viewer might start feeling a little crazy like the characters.
There’s a serious theme behind Bugonia: the climate crisis and its threat to human life. It dovetails with Lanthimos’ bitterly satiric viewpoint. Plemmons is more energetic in this role than I’ve seen him before. Stone is fine in her difficult part. Delbis practically steals the picture as poor cousin Don. The fantastic ending is absurd, hilarious, and sad.
