Bugonia

You all saw that the earth got flatter as the countdown to the lunar eclipse progressed, yes? Was it just me? There are a few directors and motion picture story tellers out there who are known for style, and at the same time have a unique story to tell every time. Yorgos Lanthimos is top of that chart for me. Since discovering him with 2018's The Favourite, everything he has done has been fresh, creative, eccentric, deep, whimsically allegorical, and important to discussions of the zeitgeist of its release period. Bugonia is no exception. I googled the meaning of Bugonia before I started up on the movie, thinking this would be related to rituals and/or bees. In a way, it kinda was, but it wasn't at all, and still that title makes sense after the last big event of the movie takes place. I love it when movies refuse to spoon-feed audiences by having characters announce what they are doing, or about to do, or had done before. The characters just talk as though there is no audience watching them, immersed in the essence of who they are and the archetypes they represent, and the audience simply pick up on the story and story foundations from direct conversational callouts and context clues. I also love it when movies that are brilliant (plot set-up, dialogue direction, shot compositions, leading score) don't throw the fact that it is brilliant in our faces. It lets the audience do little thematic and referential scavenger-hunts in their minds to discover this brilliance for themselves. No superfluous word choices, no desire to overcomplicate, just precise, surgical implants of brilliance in sound and images. And then, we get to the janus status of Emma Stone's character. The way it played itself out. Chef's morafocken kiss! You question the character even after the movie is done. I want to see more Yorgos-Jesse-Emma combo movies until one of them runs out of ideas. That doesn't seem like a thing that would ever happen though. The comedy!! Yorgos' brand of comedy: sharp, cutting, often macabre, but ultimately designed to not hide the sarcasm for the trained ears (and eyes) at all! It's crazy how I watched a movie about the effects of radicalization and swimming in an echo chamber just two movies ago (Anniversary). (I guess the world needs more of these?) Bugonia is more about the latter though. The radicalization part happens before the events of the movie start. The lesson in this movie? Several. Trauma is insidious. The answer to hurt is not the inflicting of more hurt. You're a microcosm of what you feed your mind. We need the bees. 5/5 Movies I’ve Reviewed - Ranked