Awake not Woke!

Bugonia and those forgotten Academy Award winners

I did like Poor Things from Yorgos Lanthimos. Did it deserve an award? No. Nominated films today do not deserve any awards. Zero. Half the time they're forgotten in 10 seconds. Think: Captain Phillips and Barkhad Abdi. Bugonia is heading for an Academy nomination and it's not terrible, not great either. I had to fast forward most of the second half due to disgust of the main "antagonists". Don and Teddy are far too eccentric and full of nonsense that they need to be skipped, but I do like Emma Stone and she adds a lot to the film. Holy Christ, I forgot she was in Movie 43. That film was awful. I think Yorgos and Stone's collaboration is moving her career in a fun direction. And we all saw the twist at the end coming. As for the not-so-subtle Hollywood leftist psychobabble in Bugonia: it's there alright, but I'm taking a pass on calling it out since it kind of fits the narrative. Kind of. Like other reviewers said on this site, just because it's there doesn't immediately woke score the entire film. You'll know it when you see it if you watch Bugonia and it's worth a watch, just not an Academy award which it will for sure receive.

It's not overly woke despite the mixed race couple. The lead actor is a trans male pretending to be female. It's pretty obvious right from the start. There is an out of nowhere make out scene with trans and a woman. It is completely pointless to the story and feels so forced in just for the agenda. The acting is not great. The pace is very slow choosing to spend a lot of time on the family drama. The story makes no sense with holes everywhere in the writing. While I did finish it I wasn't paying a lot of attention for the last half hour so I may have missed some things. These 'creatures' let's call them, that are chasing her don't ever actually do anything. They just chase her them stop scream and reach towards her. Yes it's creepy but after the first couple time you realize nothing is going to happen, and it's no longer effective. Then there is the weird groundhog day affect when they scream. It just is it's never explained. The creatures seem to want to reproduce by catching you sleeping and spitting eggs in you mouth that then travel to the ovaries. Last I checked that's not how that works, I mean they would end up in the stomach. The 2 guys in the hallway shooting at each other was stormtrooper levels of aiming. There's small things like the family showing up at the resort with a dog who just vanished never to be seen again. Lazy writing again. There's not any blood or gore to speak of save one scene so if that's your thing don't bother.

Feminism Ruins Another Good Show!

Season 1 was good, but season 2 has elevated the feminist empowerment of all main female characters even killing off Monty Miller the oil tycoon so he could be replaced by GI Jane who wears the permanent Halloween mask of cosmetic surgery gone wrong. But as long as the feminist narrative is forced on viewers to the detriment of season one's credibility nothing else matters, right? I guess I should be glad it isn't transgenderism.

Visually Beautiful, Flat Story

Not much woke here at least in the form of a heavy handed agenda. The film does a hard stop in the movie so the male Sasquatch can choose his own name… “Susan.” It’s meant to be comedy, but it’s meh and there’s some they/them pronouns thrown around for good measure to set up the joke. It just falls flat. There’s a great bit of chatter about evolution more as an evolved way of thinking rather than in a missing link sort of way. Look beneath the surface, you’ll see the preachy woke plainly. But if you watch this superficially, you can be entertained. Like I said, it is visually stunning. Not heavy handed. Just dull in my opinion. Your results may vary.