This past weekend DC saw its first big snowstorm of the 2025-26 Winter season. A polar vortex descended on swaths of the American midwest, northeast and southeast. We got about 14 inches of snow dumped on us. Aubinoe, my landlord and property manager, did not salt the driveway, naturally. They also have yet to send any kind of snow-clearing crew. As of 3:50 pm on Monday, the driveway is almost a solid ice sheet. There are banks of snow on the roads and I see cars get stuck on the hill outside my place every hour or so. I've stepped out to help two so far, but can't spend all day doing that.
Enough complaining about the weather. Now's a perfect time to stay put inside and watch movies. Several friends have recommended watching Yorgos Lanthimos' Bugonia, so I opted for that Saturday night. Bugonia stars Emma Stone and Jesse Plemons as two dueling characters in a dystopian present day America. Emma Stone is a steely-eyed corporate executive, whose morning routine included vigorous exercise and martial arts practice. She drives a mercedes to her ritzy-modern corporate headquarters in the middle of nowhere. She's a hard-driving executive, with high expectations of her works and feigning empathy by somewhat excusing them at 5:30 pm, if they've completed their day's work. On her drive home she blasts and sings along to Chappel Roan. Right off the bat, her characters seems to be a reflection of pop culture, workaholic corporatism, faux-empathy, and unapologetic immersion in the decadence of modern luxuries.
Opposite of her is Jesse Plemons. A societally sidelined, rural Georgia package-factory worker. Plemon's character, Teddy, lives with his cousin, Don, somewhere in the woods of Georgia. He works by day at an Amazon look-alike shipping factory. By night, he's working on a master plan to save humans from their own follies and from a corrupt alien invasion. The alien of his focus - Emma Stone. Teddy has concocted a plan and enlisted Don, who may be autistic. Don is at times skeptical, some times bought in though he struggles to believe everything Teddy tells him. But Don loves Teddy and wants to help him. Teddy and Don's relationship is defined by Teddy's desperation, paranoia, yet dogged persistence to rectify their situation. Through his desperation, though, it seems Teddy does love Don. Don has steadfast loyalty and empathy from Teddy, though he struggles to understand the mission and is incredibly doubtful at times. This is most apparent when Teddy tortures Stone's character later on. Don is not driven by paranoia. He is hopeful. He even wants a partner and to "be with someone someday." At the end, convinced by Stone's insistence that she can save him, he has succumbed to some hopelessness and takes her way out.
Don's character is incredibly hard for me to write about. He's extemely sympathetic and his story is sad. Yet the frantic pace of the movie does not let you dwindle. As you encounter the film's horrors, you are also ushered forward by the preposterous circumstances and dark humor. The movie is clearly funny at times, but, for me, the horror of the film overpowers any humor. You're left with a strong dissonance.