Saltburn Movie Review: A Fierce Examination of British Society in a Historical Sense
Cast: Barry Keoghan, Jacob Elordi, Rosamund Pike, Richard E. Grant, Carey Mulligan
Director: Emerald Fennell
Streaming Platform: Amazon Prime Video
Filmyhype.com Ratings: 4/5 (four stars)
Saltburn is a dream, a golden interlude in Oliver’s gray and sad life. Or at least that’s what we imagine, seeing this shy but brilliant student gravitate towards the bright star of Felix, the lucky and wealthy boy who for mysterious reasons takes Oliver under his protection and takes him with him to the family estate. For his second directorial, Emerald Fennell chooses a tale of power and ambition, which in exposing people’s desires and weaknesses, at the most visceral and dark levels conceivable by the human soul, has several points of contact with that Promising Young Woman which three years ago catapulted her to the center of Hollywood’s attention, no longer only as a refined interpreter (she was Camilla Parker Bowles in The Crown) but also as a screenwriter and filmmaker with very clear ideas.
After having triumphed with American critics and being released a week early in English and US cinemas, Saltburn, a film written, directed, and co-produced (together with Margot Robbie and Josey McNamara) will be available for streaming from 22 December exclusively on Prime Video. ) by Emerald Fennell, an Oscar winner for the screenplay of A Promising Woman, her directorial debut, and also known for playing Camilla Parker Bowles in The Crown Season 3 and The Crown Season 4 and for co-writing Killing Eve. Saltburn mixes black comedy (or black humor), psychological thriller, and drama, with a masterful interpretation by the protagonist Barry Keoghan and the rest of the cast, from Jacob Elordi (Euphoria) to Rosamund Pike, from Richard E. Grant to Alison Oliver, Archie Madekwe and Carey Mulligan. Now, however, having made all the premises and given all the basic information of the case, we cannot avoid explaining why, as we write in the title of this review, Saltburn is in our opinion the most disturbing film we have seen in 2023.
Saltburn Movie Review: The Story Plot
In 2006, Oliver Quick (Keoghan) was a new Oxford student, of the “I read every book recommended by the tutor at an average of a book or two a day” type. He is shy, reserved, and doesn’t make friends easily. Felix Catton (Elordi) is completely different: rich, handsome, full of friends and girls who buzz around him and who would do anything to please him, as Oliver Quick of the present explains, grown up and mature but not forgetful of that period of his life. So how do two such different guys get to know each other? Thanks to the case. One day Oliver is cycling towards the library and comes across Felix who has instead been left stranded by his bike with a flat tire and is late for a lesson. Oliver lends him his bike, and Felix is so grateful that he introduces him to his circle of friends, the most exclusive in Oxford.
How exclusive, or rather rich, Felix is, Oliver understands when he accepts his friend’s invitation to spend the summer on the Catton estate in Saltburn, in the English countryside, with Felix’s parents, Elspeth (Pike) and James (Grant) and sister Venetia (Alison Oliver). Oliver approaches a world that “doesn’t belong to him”, as the people who don’t love him are keen to remind him, but he is not the type to be easily discouraged, by the contrary. But we won’t say anything other than take a look at the trailer before reading on.
With Saltburn, Fennell delves into the world of university campuses for rich and gifted young people. Oliver Quick (Barry Keoghan) is a boy from a humble social background, who attends Oxford University only thanks to his scholarship for academic merit, struggling to find his place on a campus frequented mostly by heirs and privileged young people. Oliver is naturally fascinated by the aristocratic world that surrounds him at school and begins to develop a very close friendship with Felix Catton (Jacob Elordi), a scion of a wealthy family and his classmate. This relationship becomes so close that the rich young man decides to invite Oliver to his home for the summer, on the Saltburn estate. An invitation too flattering to refuse. But, once he arrives on the estate, the boy finds himself surrounded by sumptuous halls, gardens with labyrinths, and his friend’s noble and eccentric family members, an environment that will force Oliver to ask himself questions about who he is and what he wants from life.
Saltburn Movie Review and Analysis
Let’s make it clear right away: Saltburn is the furthest thing the English filmmaker could have achieved from the dazzling debut of Promising Young Woman, even if in essence it respects and most likely shares all the trappings of a top-notch revenge movie. Free from conformist impulses and enriched by a ruthless and unmediated look at its characters, the second film directed by Fennell surprises, captures, and disgusts with its courage and sense of provocation. Drawing liberally from literary and cinematographic suggestions that are distant and yet so close, the director sets up her dark comedy starting from the Bildungsroman that made the novelist Charles Dickens famous in the 19th century. Starting from the name and the narrative incipit in which we get to know our protagonist, Oliver Quick played by an enigmatic and disturbing Barry Keoghan, here at a very successful litmus test in front of the camera after the well-deserved Oscar nomination for The Spirits of the Island.
As in the best novels of the British writer, Quick enters the university environment climbing the social hierarchy and privilege with many difficulties, eventually making friends with the aristocrat and womanizer Felix Catton, son of an upper-class family whose soon will get to know you closely. In the elegant and decadent Gothic estate of Saltburn, Oliver Quick will soon learn to fall into the subtle good graces of Sir James Catton (Richard E. Grant), his wife Elsbeth (Rosamund Pike), Felix’s bubbly and unpredictable cousin, Farleigh Start (Archie Madekwe) and the charming Venetia Catton (Alison Oliver), apparently unapproachable sister of the sculptural character played by Jacob Elordi. It will be an unforgettable and perverse summer, in which Oliver will progressively reveal his true intentions towards the cold aristocratic family, in a lethal game of seduction and sensuality that initially takes on the flavor of the best novels by Patricia Highsmith (above all, the dominant reference and more natural is that of The Talented Mr. Ripley), then turns into an uncomfortable social-sexual climb that pays homage with respect and originality to Pier Paolo Pasolini’s seminal Theorem.
Wrapped in a smoky and chiaroscuro direction of photography curated by Oscar winner Linus Sandgren (La La Land), Saltburn is a cinematic journey of a psychosexual nature that enhances the contrasts and contradictions of its shadowy protagonist through a chromatic staging and content of great effect. One gets the feeling, when the package is opened, that the second feature film written and directed by Emerald Fennell travels on tracks that are certainly less traveled than the post-feminist impulses (but perhaps generally more successful in its entirety) of A Promising Woman, and yet Saltburn takes great pains to deliver to the contemporary viewing public a caustic and poisonous cross-section of a current neo-bourgeoisie on the brink of an inevitable ethical and moral precipice.
To accelerate the process of ashy collection of the pathetic and inaccessible remnants of this former aristocracy, however, the ambiguous Oliver Quick takes care of it, who approaches, insinuates himself, seduces, screws, and destroys the Catton family from within, as a new and unprecedented an ambitious and unpredictable literary anti-hero, who, to punish his intended victims, gets his hands dirty with the same emotional filth with which they were smeared. Mission on behalf of social revenge that leaves behind destruction and debris, bricks that support the foundations of a solitary and ancient manor that is finally empty, free to breathe vivifying air absolved from the sins of its ghostly tenants.
But all these technical and directorial measures would have been in vain if those two actors hadn’t been in front of the lens. Jacob Elordi undoubtedly confirms himself as a star on the rise; after having appreciated him in Euphoria and waiting to see him in the role of Elvis in Priscilla by Sofia Coppola, the teenage idol takes up all the space on the big screen, with his soaring and energetic, naturally charming presence. He counterbalances him with an extraordinary Barry Keoghan, who came to the attention of the public last season thanks to The Spirits of the Island, a film for which he collected several awards and an Oscar nomination, the Irish interpreter shows off remarkable charisma. Much shorter and stockier than Felix/Elordi, his Oliver is a treasure chest of surprises, of tones, of inflections, a bottomless well of unfathomable thoughts that are gradually brought to the surface, until the final scene in which Keoghan shines in all its skill.
But all these technical and directorial measures would have been in Aware of the language and the medium, Emerald Fennell demonstrates that she has a precise and cohesive idea of storytelling and that she is an important voice in the contemporary cinematic panorama. After a dazzling debut, with Lei Saltburn she demonstrates that cinema, even that of great impact, is not necessarily always “necessary” or “edifying”, it can also be gratuitously bad and an end in itself. The doubt remains, in this sense, that this form of story is just an exercise in style, a sadistic divertissement, a request for disengagement on the part of the filmmaker and the public. However, art does not necessarily have to be ethical or educational, sometimes it can also just shock and disturb the viewer, like a splendid gift package full of horrors.
Saltburn Movie Review: The Last Words
Ultimately, Saltburn is a film made “disgustingly” well. If you are ready to be hit over and over again in the heart and stomach you cannot miss it, but if you are looking for something light you will end up tortured for being hard. You just need to know. The second feature film behind the Camera by Emerald Fennell dodges all preconceived expectations and subverts social systems and classism in favor of a story that straddles Charles Dickens’ Bildungsroman, Patricia Highsmith’s ambiguity, and Pier Paolo’s sexual brazenness Pasolini. The result is a sensual and perverse film that will be discussed for a long time to come. However, art does not necessarily have to be ethical or educational, sometimes it can also just shock and disturb the viewer, like a splendid gift package full of horrors.
Saltburn Movie Review: A Fierce Examination of British Society in a Historical Sense - Filmyhype
Director: Emerald Fennell
Date Created: 2023-12-22 14:02
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Pros
- Visually stunning: The film boasts lush cinematography, capturing the grandeur of the English countryside and the opulent interiors of the titular estate with a dreamy, almost painterly quality.
- Gripping performances: Barry Keoghan delivers a nuanced portrayal of Oliver, a young man caught in a web of deceit, while Jacob Elordi exudes both charm and menace as the enigmatic Felix. The supporting cast, including Rosamund Pike and Richard Coyle, is equally impressive.
- Twisty plot: The narrative unfolds with a series of unexpected turns, keeping you guessing until the very end. Fennell masterfully blurs the lines between reality and illusion, creating a palpable sense of suspense.
- Provocative themes: Saltburn tackles complex themes of class, privilege, and identity with a sharp edge. It's a film that invites discussion and interpretation, leaving viewers with much to ponder long after the credits roll.
Cons
- Ambiguous to a fault: The film's open-endedness can be frustrating for some viewers who crave clear answers and resolutions. The lack of closure may leave you feeling lost and unsatisfied.
- Slow pacing: The deliberate pacing may feel draggy at times, especially for those expecting a fast-paced thriller. The film takes its time to build atmosphere and develop its characters, which may not be for everyone.
- Difficult to follow: The cryptic dialogue and dreamlike sequences can be confusing, making it hard to grasp the full picture. Multiple viewings may be necessary to fully appreciate the film's nuances.
- Not for everyone: Saltburn's unconventional storytelling and challenging themes may not appeal to all audiences. If you prefer straightforward narratives and clear-cut endings, this film may not be your cup of tea.
