Slather on the antihistamine cream and get ready for the Andromedan invasion, the one that’s killing Earth’s bees and subjecting humans to subservience.

If you’ve ever thought of kidnapping your boss and accusing them of being from another planet, Bugonia will warm your heart. Sort of—in a weird and mesmerizing, fever-dream of creepy rich colors and a WTF did I just watch(?!) kind of way. I say these things with all sincerity and love for this film, for real. I can’t stop thinking about it.

Bugonia, directed by Yorgos Lanthimos and based on Jang Joon-hwan’s 2003 film, Save the Green Planet!, is intense and absurdly delicious. It made me laugh out loud at parts that made me question my own humanity, and that’s kind of the point, I think.

Michelle Fuller is a CEO who runs Auxolith, a huge pharmaceutical corporation, and Emma Stone plays the part like a real boss. The kind who works out with personal trainers on a multi-million-dollar property, then dons expensive suits, her long, flowing hair cascading with an “I have to cancel my one-on-one with you again” attitude. Also, she probably doesn’t show up until noon and then leaves at 3:00 p.m., murmuring, “hey, please go home at 5:30 p.m. Don’t stay any later. Unless you have to. Unless you haven’t finished your work.”

Well, Teddy Gatz and his cousin Don are havin’ none of that. They’ve got bees to take care of and an Andromedan CEO to kidnap (Michelle Fuller). And when they do, they shave her head and make her apply gobs of antihistamine cream to her skin, so she can’t send out a distress signal. Seriously, they’ve thought of everything.

But when they torture her and discover that she’s actually a high-ranking Andromedan, they take her out of the basement and wine and dine her at the kitchen table upstairs.

What’s on the menu? Microwaved spaghetti and meatballs, red wine, and coconut cake.

So, if you’re going to watch this movie in the theater—you might pre-game or celebrate later with a red wine that either has a space alien on the label or honeybees because bees do play a big role in this movie. Michelle Fuller is a queen bee in her own right—and everyone else is just a worker bee in her world. (Also, “bugonia” was an ancient Greek mythological practice for restoring bee colonies. I won’t go into details, but the carcass of a sacrificed ox or bull is required.)

At the local grocery store, it was a little difficult for me to find a wine with an alien space creature on the label. Plenty of beers exist that fit this description, but not wine. However, I did find the Goru Verde wine with a lovely bee graphic on the label. Also, it’s a red wine made with organic grapes, so it must be Teddy Gatz-approved.

In a glass, this wine is a vibrant ruby color. There’s a faint floral smell, that almost has me picturing Teddy Gatz’s farm-like property, lush with green trees and a beehive. This wine is tannin-forward, I would say, but not in a bad way. Sometimes, I get hints of blackberry. My spouse, who sampled the wine with me, thought he tasted hints of leather. Not sure what to make of that, but now I can’t un-taste it. And it’s not bad at all. Would I serve it with a microwaved spaghetti and meatballs entrée? Sure. Why not?

Oh, mothership of all motherships, don’t wait until the next lunar eclipse. This wine and Bugonia movie pairing is the bee’s knees for sure.

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Cecilia Kennedy once paired a viewing of Cocaine Shark with Snoop Dogg’s 19 Crimes red wine and never looked back. She’s a writer and editor living in the Greater Seattle area, who publishes mostly horror fiction, but also humor. Her works have appeared in The Daily Drunk, Tiny Molecules, Kandisha Press, DarkWinter Press, Maudlin House, Flash Fiction Magazine, Rejection Letters, 365 Tomorrows, Molotov Cocktail, and more. You can find her on X (@ckennedyhola) and Instagram (@ceciliakennedy2349) and her DIY Humor blog: https://fixinleaksnleeksdiy.blog/