Photo/Atsushi Nishijima/Focus Features

Conspiracy rabbit holes. Many people have sadly fallen into them and end up being sucked deeper and deeper into the depths of the void. This is the situation with one of the main characters of “Bugonia,” the newest film from Yorgos Lanthimos, which premiered in competition at the 2025 Venice Film Festival. I recently went to a screening of “Bugonia” with my partner, and it is an outstanding piece of absurdist cinema.  

An English-language remake of the 2003 South Korean film “Save the Green Planet!” “Bugonia” follows two men, Teddy (Jesse Plemons) and his cousin Don (Aidan Delbis), who kidnap prominent CEO Michelle Fuller (Emma Stone), whom they suspect of being an alien. At times throughout the film, Teddy is approached by Casey (Stavros Halkias), a local cop who was once his babysitter.  

In the leading role of Teddy, Jesse Plemons delivers an unhinged portrayal of this manipulative, deranged figure. Submerging himself within this character, Plemons delivers a great performance, with the suppressed anger of this paranoid conspiracy theorist simmering through most of the film’s duration, until it reaches a boiling point. This aspect is seen through the various methods of interrogation he implements in order to extract information from Michelle. Plemons previously starred in Lanthimos’ absurdist anthology film “Kinds of Kindness,” which earned him the Best Actor award at the 2024 Cannes Film Festival.  

As Michelle Fuller, Emma Stone delivers a stellar leading performance. Stone, who has collaborated with Lanthimos in recent years — with “Bugonia” being the fourth film on which she has worked with him — delivers a performance more subdued and subtle than that of her character in “Poor Things”, Bella Baxter. She delivers several of her lines in a matter-of-fact way mixed with pure bewilderment. This element of her portrayal is highlighted during the scene where she discovers that her head has been completely shaved, and she begins to ask about what happened to her hair.  

In his feature film debut, Aidan Delbis is fantastic as Don, with whom Teddy manipulates into doing his bidding. Delbis portrays this soft-spoken autistic man whom Teddy manipulated into going along with this disturbing plan. Delbis, who is autistic himself, has several standout moments throughout the film, such as his interactions with Michelle.   

At the helm of this film is director Yorgos Lanthimos. The most prominent filmmaker to emerge from the Greek Weird Wave film movement, with films such as 2011’s “Alps,” Lanthimos directs a pitch-black comedy blended with a heavy dosage of absurdism. The absurdist aspect of the film is highlighted in one of the first scenes in the film, which involves the utilization of chemical castration in order to, according to Teddy, have complete focus on the mission to kidnap Michelle. This scene sets the stage for the film’s subversive nature. There is also a sequence where Teddy and Don coat Michelle in layers of antihistamine cream. Along with sequences like these is a rather shocking sequence involving a prominent usage of the Green Day track, “Basket Case,” which caught my partner and me off guard. With these scenes, it shows that “Bugonia” is more in the same vein of the dark, cutthroat absurdism featured in “Kinds of Kindness” than “Poor Things.” 

Lanthimos layers the film in absurdist elements, such as the inclusion of dreamlike black-and-white sequences — a similar approach he took with “Poor Things” and “Kinds of Kindness” — drenching the film in a subversive narrative, while also garnering excellent performances out of the cast. 

The screenplay written by Will Tracy is also outstanding, with several lines of dialogue highlighting the absurdist scenario, such as Teddy going into detail about how Michelle is an alien.    

The cinematographer of “Bugonia,” Robbie Ryan, captures several stunning shots. Ryan, who previously collaborated with Lanthimos on “Poor Things” and “Kinds of Kindness,” captured “Bugonia” on VistaVision, a film format that was resurrected in recent years, with films such as Brady Corbert’s epic “The Brutalist” heavily utilizing the recently revived style. With the Wilcam W11 VistaVision camera, Ryan captures several outstanding shots, such as the close-up shots on Michelle’s face — coated in antihistamine cream — and the wide shots of the house that Teddy and Don reside in. Ryan also shot the beautifully filmed surrealist black-and-white sequences — the latter of which are similar to visuals that he also captured in “Poor Things” and “Kinds of Kindness.” 

With “Bugonia,” Yorgos Lanthimos directs his first remake and brings his signature blend of cutthroat absurdism with heavy doses of paranoia. With beautiful cinematography and a great cast, along with an offbeat storyline and script, “Bugonia” offers an intriguing viewing for those interested in subversive cinema. “Bugonia” showcases that Yorgos Lanthimos is not only one of the best filmmakers on the arthouse circuit, but is one of the best filmmakers working today. 

A rabbit hole of conspiracies and honey. 

“Bugonia” is now playing in theaters.  

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