Yorgos Lanthimos has always made strange movies. From the 2005 murder-recreation arthouse film Kinetta to his most recent foray, the anthology film Kinds of Kindness, the bounds of human behavior and normalcy have always been stretched. In the past decade especially, the director has veered more and more into the sci-fi realm with movies like the Frankenstein-inspired Poor Things and absurdist satire The Lobster.
Now, with his next movie, he’s leaning fully into science-fiction with a remake of a classic alien-conspiracy comedy. But don’t worry, there are still classic Yorgos Lanthimos elements of cultural commentary. Check out the trailer for the new movie below.
Bugonia is a remake of the 2003 Korean sci-fi comedy Save the Green Planet!, which follows a conspiracy theorist as he kidnaps a powerful executive, convinced he’s an alien. In Bugonia, that executive is clearly played by Emma Stone, who is kidnapped by a beekeeper (Jesse Plemons) and his friend (Aidan Delbis).
What follows is a twisted story of delusion, deception, and a tragic backstory which reveals just why this strange man is obsessed with the executive in the first place. The 2003 original is the perfect choice for Lanthimos as it balances the goofy with the dark and brutal, especially with Will Tracy, writer for Succession and showrunner of the underwatched satire The Regime, handling the screenplay.
In the original movie, there’s a big twist involving actual aliens bringing about the apocalypse, so it’s likely this movie will go the same route. If so, it would mark Lanthimos’ first alien sci-fi movie. But this movie is clearly more than just that: it’s a star-studded take on what happens when you convince yourself of something and refuse to believe differently, a theme that’s unfortunately way more relevant today than it was in the 2003 original.
But if any person can take this oddball hidden gem of a movie and not only adapt it but update and elevate it with his signature offbeat eye, it’s Yorgos Lanthimos. And with the one-two punch of Jesse Plemons and Emma Stone on board, it’ll hopefully charm audiences too.
