The Writer Explains the Numerous Wild Turns of Emma Stone's Latest Science Fiction Movie

The film screenwriter the writer barely recalls what transpires in Save the Green Planet!. That’s a bit of a surprise, given that he crafted the screenplay for Yorgos Lanthimos’s latest reimagining of the 2003 Korean dark sci-fi comedy. Rather than analyzing the original script for inspiration, the writer behind his previous work viewed the movie once, took a few notes, and got to work.

“I watched Save the Green Planet once,” Tracy explains. “I didn’t really remember the film all that well. I didn't want to feel as though I had to be faithfully adapting or recreating or paying tribute to someone else's vision. The most respectful approach to those movies was to have them be judged separately.”

While the premise of a mentally unstable man (Jesse Plemons in Bugonia) who kidnaps a pharmaceutical executive he’s convinced is an alien in disguise is largely the same in each movie, the differences are considerable. Firstly, the writer rewrote the executive character, originally male in the director's first version, as a female character. (Lanthimos cast his frequent collaborator the actress in the role.) The endings vary a bit too, in the way they address their central question: Is the character an alien in disguise or not?

The screenwriter feels that answer is a bit irrelevant.

“I never was really concerned with the twist aspect,” he comments. “My intention wasn't for the movie to just be a gadget that performs one surprise, and then after the reveal, it's like: Alright, so what's next?”

However, Tracy has a lot to say on the subject. The interview with the writer covered Bugonia’s ending and its implications, along with the ways he and the director worked together to bring those twists to life.

Warning: Full spoilers follow for the conclusion of Bugonia.

So is the character an extraterrestrial or not an alien?

Short answer: Absolutely.

Just like in Save the Green Planet, the conclusion of Bugonia discloses that Stone’s character, a pharmaceutical executive named Michelle Fuller, is actually alien royalty in disguise. After tricking her captor the unstable man (Plemons) into ending his own life using her teleportation technology, she beams back up to her alien vessel.

The reality that this is unexpected is a proof to her performance. Throughout the 118-minute movie, she maintains suspense through a layered performance that may take several rewatches to comprehend entirely.

“Emma talked a lot about how it was the initial instance she had to give a performance where she felt she had to be aware of people viewing it again. How those rewatching are going to think,” the writer says. "She knew the second time a person watches this film, They know that I know that I'm… understand?”

He trails off, before adding, “So she had to be aware of that in her acting.”

Creating the Andromedons and their vessel

Once Stone’s character finally does reveal her true nature, we get a quick look of her spaceship and fellow aliens before the film concludes. Their ship has a distinct appearance, which Tracy reveals was meant to look like a marine animal while steering clear of high-tech visuals.

“[The director] was really interested in almost like a jellyfish-type design for the spaceship, something quite organic,” he says.

They should feel strangely somewhat primitive or ancient.

The aliens' clothing is just as interesting as their ship: rounded robes made from large, ropey threads. Once more, the aim was to defy conventional science fiction.

“For the costumes, rather than being futuristic, they [were meant to|aimed to] appear unusually somewhat primitive or primitive, and yet also quite ornate and not primitive, because it's such an intricate and elegant creation on those strange knit costumes,” Tracy states. He notes that the director “viewed it as being a extremely old society. He wasn't into the idea of any element being sleek and silver, or a hyper-futuristic look.”

The conclusion of the Earth (or only humanity)

Maybe the biggest difference between the new film and the original is that in the first version, the aliens respond to their leader's kidnapping and abuse by blowing up the world. Bugonia takes a somewhat more nuanced approach, with its aliens opting to snuff out all human life, while keeping the Earth and its remaining creatures unharmed.

“My intention to achieve in the screenplay was a vision of Earth post-human existence,” Tracy explains.

In the film's conclusion, we see a sequence of scenes of life across the planet. Every person are deceased where they were standing moments earlier, but the Earth keeps spinning. How viewers, are meant to make of these events is open to discussion. Does the conclusion of Bugonia optimistic or pessimistic? Are people doomed or worth saving? Would the world be better off without us?

The screenwriter isn’t willing to provide a definitive answer in any direction.

“Some people find it to be a extremely dark ending, or a sad ending, a hopeless ending,” he states. “Different audiences view it as being a oddly optimistic or positive conclusion. I think there are various interpretations to read it.”

The film is currently in limited theatrical release at present, with a broader opening on Halloween.