Rating: R | Runtime: 118 minutes
Release Date: October 24th, 2025 (USA)
Studio: Focus Features
Director(s): Yorgos Lanthimos
Writer(s): Will Tracy / Jang Joon-hwan (script Save the Green Planet!)

I’m not a sick ape!

Will Tracy truly cut the chaff from Jang Joon-hwan’s Save the Green Planet! to focus solely on what made it so unique: its paranoid sci-fi conceit. Bugonia completely excises the external distractions inherently created by a police investigation constantly removing us from the absurd philosophical debate of its leads. It’s now all about Teddy (Jesse Plemons), Michelle (Emma Stone), and the inevitable imperative to push the envelope far enough to reveal the truth.

In so doing, however, Tracy also removes Jang’s silly idiosyncrasies and replaces them with a more straightforward drama built upon a metaphor between bees and humanity that doesn’t exist in the original—explicitly or implicitly. This is a strange decision considering Jang was attached to direct the remake himself before dropping out due to health concerns. I therefore wonder if this was a brand new script specifically catered to Yorgos Lanthimos’ own sensibilities upon boarding the project.

Because this is very much a Yorgos film despite retaining every crucial narrative beat within the Korean original. Its visuals are meticulously composed. Its rage proves more politically motivated in its personal quest for vengeance while still remaining darkly comic. The unforgettable fantasy flashbacks are rendered in a style that brought Lars von Trier’s Melancholia and Antichrist to mind. And Aidan Delbis injects a welcome dose of innocence and heart that helps the themes hit harder than Jang’s otherwise self-serving cast of eccentrics.

I’m also a sucker for an epilogue montage of silent vignettes that looks like it singlehandedly ate up most of the total budget.

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(L to R) Aidan Delbis as Don, Jesse Plemons as Teddy and Emma Stone as Michelle in director Yorgos Lanthimos’ BUGONIA, a Focus Features release. Credit: Atsushi Nishijima/Focus Features © 2025 All Rights Reserved.