Let's get one thing straight from the start. "Saltburn" can be categorized as part of the recent run of satires about the class divide, but this isn't the only thing on its mind. No, "Saltburn" is also a torrid Gothic romance with an obsessive love story at its core. The structure is very Hitchcock's "Rebecca," with the titular Saltburn standing in for Manderley, and an oddball Oxford student named Oliver Quick (Barry Keoghan) as our second Mrs. DeWinter. Except, Saltburn and its residents are not too difficult to parse, while Oliver turns out to be much more of a mystery.
The first, pre-Saltburn part of "Saltburn" follows Oliver at Oxford, where he's a quiet, friendless nobody. However, by lucky happenstance he comes into the orbit of the rich, popular Felix Catton (Jacob Elordi) and his more hostile cousin Farleigh (Archie Madekwe). Oliver and Felix's friendship has some ups and downs, but the two are chummy enough by the holidays for Felix to invite Oliver to his family home, Saltburn, an outrageously opulent mansion. The rest of the family includes Felix's parents (Richard E. Grant, Rosamund Pike) and his sister Venetia (Alison Oliver) - all privileged and terrible in their own ways.
Writer and director Emerald Fennell tries to do a lot in "Saltburn," and some of it really doesn't work. Every time she tries to make "Saltburn" a thriller, it feels clumsy and tonally off. She throws lobs at the narcissism and thoughtlessness of the upper (and upper middle) class, but there's nothing deeper to the criticism. However, whenever the focus is on Oliver's increasingly lurid obsessions, or about luxuriating in the hedonism and excess of being so stinking rich, the film is mesmerizing. I find myself absolutely willing to forgive all manner of cinematic sins because I'm so thrilled that Emerald Fennell went this hard being this aesthetically indulgent. The fantasies on display are downright vulgar, but rendered so gorgeously that it all ends up being breathtaking. The frequent exhortation in filmmaking is to "show, don't tell," and Fennell shows us everything, and then some.
I also love what every single actor in the cast is doing. Barry Keoghan has made a career playing creeps and oddballs, and he makes Oliver a total freak in every sense of the word. It's a slow burn to the degeneracy, but worth the wait. This may not be Keoghan's best performance, but it's the one he's likely going to be best remembered for. Likewise, Jacob Elordi has established himself as the heartthrob of the year with "Priscilla," and as Felix he's utterly perfect at embodying effortless pulchritude. Felix is such a scumbag, but you almost love him for it. Richard E. Grant and Rosamund Pike as the elder Cattons are a pair of well-practiced villains, operating in such myopic terms with reality that they're as funny as they are horrible. They're very thin caricatures, but endlessly entertaining ones.
Then there's Saltburn itself. The film takes place mostly in 2006, which informs the music and fashion choices, but there's a timelessness to the Cattons and their circle that eventually subsumes everything. The house is stuffed with priceless antiquities and heirlooms, with a stone-faced butler (Paul Rhys) always hovering somewhere nearby. There's some humor milked out of mundane household activities and detritus existing in contrast with such extravagant surroundings. However, by the end of the film Oliver and the Cattons are throwing bacchanals and reenacting Greek tragedies, while playing out class warfare in very unsubtle terms.
I'm not surprised that "Saltburn" has been very polarizing, or that there are viewers who think the film was a total failure. I don't think that Fennell quite worked out the details of the finale well enough to pull off what she tried to pull off. However, I think it's important to remember that the anti-hero is also an unreliable narrator, and I suspect that what some are taking at face value is actually his reframing of events to suit his own chosen narrative. And I think Oliver was in love, really, the entire time. But then, I'm a sucker for fancy cinematography and lonely outsiders.
And good grief, I love an old fashioned, deeply twisted love story.
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