BUGONIA (OPENING CEREMONY)

 

One of Yorgos Lanthimos' most enjoyable and skillfully directed films, with a wonderful Emma Stone in the lead role, "Bugonia" is inspired by the contemporary numbness of an entire planet manipulated by fake news, endless eschatology, and a general paranoia further exacerbated by COVID. Successfully balancing comedy and drama, the film initially recounts the kidnapping and hostage-taking of a managing director of a powerful pharmaceutical company by two men who have fed their minds with so many conspiracy theories that they are convinced the cold and ruthless CEO is in fact an alien entity who has come to our planet to insidiously lead it to its destruction. Starting off deliriously with a plot that questions the dangers of misinterpreting the truth in a world which insists on constantly distorting it, Lanthimos rolls his story towards a delirious third part that attempts to answer with sardonic humor the same burning question that has been posed so frequently in cinema: Does humanity really deserve to be saved, and allowed to perpetuate itself, after the sins and wrongdoing it has serially committed? L.K.

 

DIRECTOR: Yorgos Lanthimos

SCREENWRITER: Will Tracy

DoP: Robbie Ryan

MUSIC: Jerskin Fendrix

EDITOR: Yorgos Mavropsaridis

PRINCIPAL CAST: Emma Stone, Jesse Plemons, Aidan Delbis, Stavros Halkias, Alicia Silverstone

 

A distinguished Greek filmmaker, born in 1973. Five Oscar nominations, Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival, Screenplay Award at Cannes and Jury Prize at the same festival, are just some of the major distinctions that make him perhaps the most honored Greek filmmaker in history. He has directed films, theater, short films, music videos, and commercials. He studied at the Hellenic Cinema and Television School Stavrakos in Athens.