Emma Stone, Jesse Plemons, and Aidan Delbis star in the latest from director Yorgos Lanthimos.
The films of Yorgos Lanthimos are always just slightly off. On the surface, they look sort of normal, but just below that, there’s something unexpected. A man looking for love, but if he doesn’t find it, he’s turned into an animal. A woman explores her sexual prime, but actually, she’s a reanimated corpse. Those sorts of things. Bugonia, the latest from the talented filmmaker, is kind of that, but also not. It’s got a weird twist to it, but the twist, this time, is the point. The whole film is centered on this question of how to perceive what’s happening, and by focusing on that weirdness, Lanthimos has created a film with tension, poignancy, and accessibility that’s beyond pretty much all of his previous films. It’s phenomenal.
Teddy and Don (Jesse Plemons and Aidan Delbis) are cousins who live together somewhere in rural America. They’ve had a rough life, which, in Teddy’s case in particular, has made him very susceptible to blaming others. And, in blaming others, he’s become obsessed with a conspiracy theory that aliens live among us and intend to take over the planet. One of those aliens, Teddy thinks, is Michelle (Emma Stone), the CEO of a powerful pharmaceutical company. Teddy then convinces his cousin Don to help him kidnap Michelle, hoping she’ll put them in contact with other aliens so they can save the world.
Only Michelle isn’t an alien, right? Is she? She couldn’t be.
