Bugonia
Quick Summary
Bugonia is a 2025 black comedy film directed by Yorgos Lanthimos, starring Emma Stone and Jesse Plemons. The movie centers on two men who become convinced that a powerful corporate CEO is an alien and that kidnapping her is the only way to save the world. Their beliefs are fueled by pseudoscientific ideas and conspiracy theories.123
The film's title, "Bugonia," is intentionally ambiguous and draws from an ancient Mediterranean belief that bees spontaneously emerge from the decaying carcasses of slaughtered cattle. This term, combining Greek roots for "ox" and "offspring," was used to describe honeybees as "ox-born". The belief is notably featured in Virgil's epic poem, the Georgics. In the film, the title can be interpreted as a metaphor for new life arising from the ruins of a corrupt entity.3
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Jesse PlemonsThe Irishman, The Power of the Dog, and Killers of the Flower Moon…starred in another Lanthimos film, Bugonia, as a conspiracy theorist who, with his cousin, kidnaps a businesswoman, convinced that she is secretly a dangerous extraterrestrial.
Read More…starred in another Lanthimos film, Bugonia, as a conspiracy theorist who, with his cousin, kidnaps a businesswoman, convinced that she is secretly a dangerous extraterrestrial.
Read More
Emma StoneCruella, Poor Things, and Bugonia…control and consent, and then Bugonia (2025), in which she gave an Oscar-nominated performance as the chief executive officer of a pharmaceutical company who is abducted by a conspiracy-theory-addled man (Jesse Plemons) and his cousin, who think she is secretly a dangerous alien in disguise.
Read More…control and consent, and then Bugonia (2025), in which she gave an Oscar-nominated performance as the chief executive officer of a pharmaceutical company who is abducted by a conspiracy-theory-addled man (Jesse Plemons) and his cousin, who think she is secretly a dangerous alien in disguise.
Read More