Emma Stone and Jesse Plemons star in Yorgos Lantimos’ remake of the South Korean classic ‘Save the Green Planet!’
In crafting their remake of Jang Joon-hwan’s Save the Green Planet! (2003), writer Will Tracy and director Yorgos Lanthimos keep the dramatic arc of the original, but are careful not to trace too far outside of its narrative.
Working with cinematographer Robbie Ryan and an ace production team, Lanthimos makes his version fly, often literally, as the camera whirls in front of Teddy (an unhinged Jesse Plemons), racing back and forth from his rural home in Georgia to the immaculately-designed, Amazon-like factory where he contributes anonymously to the assembly line of anonymous consumer goods that are shipped out every day.
His primary preoccupation, it is soon revealed, is not his day job but the nights and weekends in which he prepares to kidnap his boss for her nefarious role as an alien creature from the planet Andromeda who is only pretending to be human as her true native people steer the ignorant, docile human race toward chaos and self-immolation. Once kidnapped, in the early moments of the film, and chained up in the basement of the overstuffed house by Teddy and his cousin Don (Aidan Delbis), who appears to suffer from a learning disability of some sort, poor Michelle (Emma Stone) must suffer all sorts of indignities as Teddy insists that she can communicate with her alien mothership and negotiate their immediate retreat from Planet Earth.
Even though it’s been more than 20 years since I saw the highly-touted, darkly comic, and highly accomplished original — I was so eager to see it I sprung for the special import DVD edition, complete in an outsized cardboard container! — the basic arc of the story remained in my brain, along with the tone, which I found quite hilarious. Whether my memory has become faulty like a sieve or Tracy and Lanthimos decided to make their new version fairly straightforward, with a dose of lunacy added to downshift the bodily horrors that are unleashed upon the chained-up corporate executive, the end result is Bugonia, which is completely enjoyable to watch, simply as a piece of creative cinema, while never taking more than a false and timid step toward a trenchant commentary on ‘Modern Life in the United States.
Indeed, in the singular sequence in which Teddy responds to the exec’s eventually exasperated needling that he is an unwitting victim of social pressures unleashed by the internet in general and social media in specific, the film swiftly moves onward to the next plot point without dwelling too long on that possible hot point which might divide audiences. Yet audiences today need to be pushed a little to garner a more pungent reaction; as it is, Bugonia is well-performed and well-produced, but never feels like essential or vital entertainment.
The film opens tomorrow in select area theaters, via Focus Features. For more information about the film, visit the official site.
Dallas Film Now. 