Courtesy of Focus Features
Emma Stone could very well be an alien in Yorgos Lanthimos’ absurdist new dark comedy “Bugonia,” a remake of Jang Joon-hwan’s 2003 cult classic “Save the Green Planet!”
Or at least, that’s the impression the filmmaker seems to be toying with. Reuniting with Stone for a third consecutive outing—following “Poor Things” and last summer’s “Kinds of Kindness”—Lanthimos once again crafts a work that is both strange and mesmerizingly opaque. True to form, he continues to prod and provoke, refusing to blunt his sharpest instincts. “Bugonia” is, by turns, a sci-fi farce, a psychological pressure cooker, and a savage satire of modern paranoia. It’s also, somehow, his most accessible film to date—though not one that seems remotely interested in chasing awards.
Jesse Plemons delivers another knockout performance as Teddy, a nervy, sweat-soaked conspiracy theorist who spends his days consuming fringe content through an echo chamber of like-minded zealots. A lowly factory worker, Teddy has become convinced that a race of extraterrestrials known as the Andromedans are infiltrating society, manipulating humanity from within, and preparing for domination. For anyone who’s ever fallen down a simulation-theory rabbit hole, this might feel uncomfortably familiar.
Together with his cousin Don (Aidan Delbis), Teddy devises a last-ditch plan to “save mankind,” by kidnapping a powerful, Jeff Bezos-like tech mogul named Michelle Fuller (Emma Stone). After abducting her, the pair shave her head, slather her in a strange protective cream, and demand she take them to her leader.
Fuller insists she’s human, but Lanthimos and writer Will Tracy keep the audience deliberately off-balance. Is she lying? Is Teddy delusional? Or is there something deeper pulsing beneath this fever dream of fear and control? Plemons channels a manic, unhinged energy reminiscent of his “U.S.S. Callister” performance, teetering between pitiful vulnerability and terrifying conviction. Stone, meanwhile, gives one of her most layered turns yet, playing Michelle as both victim and manipulator, a woman keenly aware that understanding Teddy’s psychosis might be her only way out.
As the film unfolds, Lanthimos masterfully ratchets the tension, juxtaposing moments of surreal humor with unnerving intimacy. Flashbacks to Teddy’s ailing mother (Alicia Silverstone, excellent in a brief role) reveal cracks in his psyche and suggest a deeper, tragic motivation behind his obsession. The more we learn, the less we trust anyone.
Tonally, “Bugonia” is all over the map, but that’s by design. It oscillates between dystopian paranoia and biting social commentary, lampooning everything from media addiction to corporate elitism to humanity’s self-destructive hubris. Tracy’s script keeps us guessing where our sympathies should lie, forcing us to question not just Teddy’s sanity, but our own complicity in the echo chambers we build.
The title itself—borrowed from an ancient Greek myth that bees were born from the carcasses of dead cows—proves telling. It suggests a world where life emerges from decay, where humanity’s relentless self-sabotage might still, somehow, yield something new. Lanthimos seems to be asking whether the human experiment is nearing its expiration date and whether conviction, empathy, or madness will define our final act.
“Bugonia” might not offer easy answers, but it buzzes with biting wit, grotesque humor, and an eerie sense that maybe, just maybe, we’ve already become the aliens we fear.
BUGONIA is now playing in theaters.