‘Bugonia’ movie review: Emma Stone and Jesse Plemons gloriously riff off each other in Yorgos Lanthimos’ mind-bending vision

Bugonia begins with a voice explaining the vital role bees play in the environment and how Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD) could lead to planetary destruction, evoking Sherlock Holmes in Elementary and his theories on CCD.

We see Teddy (Jesse Plemons) and his neurodivergent cousin, Don (Aidan Delbis), tending to honey bees in their apiary. Teddy and Don are training for a major job — kidnapping Michelle Fuller (Emma Stone), the CEO of a pharmaceutical firm.

Through the film, we learn Teddy’s mother, Sandy (Alicia Silverstone), was part of a drug trial for Michelle’s company, which left her in a coma. Michelle’s company is paying for Sandy’s care. Teddy is convinced Michelle is an alien from the planet Andromeda, and he plans to kidnap her and get her to take him to the emperor to seek reparation for all the ills of the planet.

We first meet Michelle as she gets ready for her day at the office with exercise, healthy food and a handful of pills. She drives off to work in a muscle car in her power suit and sweeps into her office in wickedly high Louboutins proudly flashing their red soles along the corridors.

Aidan Delbis, left, and Jesse Plemons in a scene from “Bugonia.”
| Photo Credit:
ATSUSHI NISHIJIMA

The contrast with scruffy Teddy and Don in their baggy shorts and t-shirts with unkempt hair and beards pedalling furiously along leafy lanes could not be starker. The kidnapping, while not going exactly as planned, is successful.

Teddy and Don bring Michelle into the basement of their cosy, isolated home. They shave her head and slather her with antihistamine cream to dampen her alien powers. Being a Yorgos Lanthimos movie means this incredibly clichéd situation of a woman chained in a basement with two disturbed men is going to play out differently from how it would in countless other films.

While one is prepared for a twist and the bloodbath, that operatic finale is as beautiful as it is terrible. Bugonia works as a black comedy where tension is cranked up in different ways. A police officer, Casey (Stavros Halkias), coming to the house at a critical moment, seeking to make amends with Teddy— whom he abused as a child when Casey was babysitting him — is nerve-wracking and funny.

The cinematography (Robbie Ryan) is exquisite, with VistaVision lending the frames warmth and shadow. Stone, who shaved her head for the film, and Plemons are truly at the top of their game, anchoring each absurd flight of fancy in a desperately sad reality.

Emma Stone in a scene from “Bugonia.”
| Photo Credit:
ATSUSHI NISHIJIMA

Bugonia, which comes from the Greek word “bougonia” referring to the ancient Greek belief of bees being born out of animal, particularly oxen carcasses, is a remake of Jang Joon-hwan’s South Korean film Save the Green Planet!.

While it does not beat a wholly original path — isolated people schooled entirely in the University of the Internet and cold-hearted money-grabbing technocrats, are not new — the way the film is presented demands a second and third look to fully appreciate all the sly ways it toys with one’s sense of reality.

Bugonia is currently running in theatres