Emma Stone and Yorgos Lanthimos unveil Bugonia at Venice

Emma Stone and director Yorgos Lanthimos returned to the Venice Film Festival on Thursday with Bugonia, a dark science fiction comedy that premiered in competition at the Lido and will reach U.S. theaters in late October. The film, an English language reimagining of the 2003 South Korean cult hit Save the Green Planet!, follows two conspiracy obsessed young men who kidnap a high powered CEO they are convinced is an extraterrestrial bent on destroying Earth.

At a press conference ahead of the premiere, Stone, who stars as the kidnapped CEO and also serves as a producer, described Bugonia as "reflective of this point and time in our world" and called it "fascinating and moving and funny and fucked up and alive." She joked that, given the film's themes, she herself believes in aliens, citing the late astronomer and science popularizer Carl Sagan as an influence. "I fell madly in love with his philosophy and his science," she said. "So yes, I am coming out and saying it. I believe in aliens."

Director Lanthimos said Bugonia is not simply a futuristic dystopia but a portrait of contemporary anxieties. "A lot of it is very reflective of the real world," he said, arguing the film shows...