By Eden Lozano
If you are at all concerned with the current state of the world, you should watch “Bugonia.”
Yorgos Lanthimos’ newest film is a sci-fi dark comedy about two men, Teddy and Don (Jesse Plemons and Aidan Delbi, respectively) who have suffered at the hands of a pharmaceutical company’s interference. The pair target the company’s CEO, Michelle (Emma Stone), fully convinced that she is an extraterrestrial sent to terrorize humankind. The men kidnap her and spend the film’s runtime interrogating the alleged alien.
As I’ve learned since watching, “Bugonia” is actually an English-language remake of the South Korean film “Save The Green Planet!” from 2003. The original film maintains the same overall plotline but with different characters and motivations.
The premise itself is deliberately extreme. Aliens posing as humans is one thing, but the interesting thing about “Bugonia” is that the audience doesn’t really know whether Michelle is an alien or not. Her humanity is questioned in light of her negligent actions towards the patients of her pharmaceutical company’s failures, as well as her crass treatment of Teddy and Don when they eventually explain their emotional burdens.
Teddy is the captain of the whole alien-exposing operation, complete with detailed diagrams of alien spaceships and a concerning amount of knowledge about extraterrestrial biology. But even as Teddy shares his repertoire of alien knowledge, the film frames it as if even Teddy himself is unsure of Michelle’s true identity. His cousin and only friend, Don, is the emotional center of the film who questions Teddy’s actions and the authenticity of his claims.
What sets this adaptation apart from its predecessor is the dilemma of the main characters. Michelle is a woman — a capable, intelligent, strong woman — but she’s kidnapped, tortured, and locked in the basement of two strange men. Michelle herself comments on the optics of the situation at one point — she may be a powerful woman, but she’s still a woman. Society will see what happened to her and she will go down as yet another victim of male violence. The change in dynamics adds an extra layer to the storyline.
On the other hand, Michelle is incredibly selfish and disingenuous. Teddy’s mother is in a coma after taking experimental drugs from Michelle’s pharmaceutical company. He’s poor and psychologically suffering from the emotional and financial burdens of caring for his comatose mother. Teddy maintains a bee colony with Don, but even the colony is facing a decline as the bee population dies out.
“Bugonia” is full of questions about our humanity, our morals, and the effects of the choices we make. Much of the change that we wish to see in our world doesn’t actually happen because people don’t know how to move past the “talking stage” of a plan — as evidenced by the humorous way Michelle tries to “start a dialogue” with her captors.
The truth is, you cannot simply talk your way out of a crisis. You also can’t kidnap a CEO without a solid plan or evidence that they’re an Earth-killing alien from outer space. Both capture and victim seem to be at fault here — neither side has an intact moral compass. No matter how you spin it, they’re on the extreme sides of things, unwilling to compromise or seek to understand the other. There is no real empathy. “Bugonia” lays this out from the start, and the audience must feel the constant tug of war between which side to believe.
In the future, I’d love to give “Bugonia” another watch to get a better grasp on its themes and the hints it leaves along the way. The performances are wonderful from Stone and Plemons; that fact alone is enough to encourage another careful rewatch.
I rate “Bugonia” at 4 out of 5 (extraterrestrial) stars.