‘Saltburn’ review: A glossy enigma that hits home

Written and directed by Emerald Fennell, Saltburn is a star-studded eat-the-rich fantasy that indulges Fennell’s best and worst impulses.

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Saltburn opens with Oliver Quick (Barry Keoghan, who resembles a young, compact Joel Edgerton), a name that sounds as if it came straight from a Charles Dickens’ novel, recollecting his relationship with Oxford classmate, Felix Catton (Jacob Elordi). His story spans from October 2006 through the summer of 2007 and starts like a classic fish-out-of-water story when Ollie arrives at the Oxford campus before Felix takes him under his wing.

When Oliver accepts Felix’s invitation to stay at the titular family estate for the summer, it transforms into an off-kilter, debauched jaunt with a rising undercurrent of manipulation and danger that climaxes in a revelation of motives. Fresh from her successful debut behind the camera with Promising Young Woman (2020), actor-turned-writer/director Emerald Fennell’s second film does not suffer from a sophomore slump until the last ten minutes, in which Fennell apparently felt compelled to spell everything out in case her audience did not get it — à la The Usual Suspects (1995).

Saltburn leverages assumptions made about characters’ first impressions then delights in turning the tables and revealing their underbelly. Like a schoolgirl with a crush…if that schoolgirl would later star in Fatal Attraction (1987), the studious Oliver remains on the margins, always maintaining a bird’s eye view of the action with Felix in his sights. Felix, by the way, is the cinematic fantasy of a young aristocrat: tall, wealthy, handsome, empathetic, big-hearted, carefree, vaguely embarrassed over his good fortune and unintentionally, casually cruel by circulating admirers out of his circle once they lose their luster.

“Oliver, I love you.”

Felix’s American cousin Farleigh Start (Midsommar’s Archie Madekwe), who seems effortless and comfortable in all environments, casually eviscerates Oliver soon after he steps on campus. Instead of getting eaten alive, however, Oliver holds his ground and the two will parry throughout the course of the movie. Their cattiness could power the entire estate, which was filmed on location at Drayton House in Northhamptonshire, England, and proves that Oliver may stand a chance when he shifts to the tonier environs of Felix’s family home.

Part of the pleasure in watching Saltburn is vicariously living through Oliver, getting a peek at how the other half lives and enjoying their largesse while feeling the frisson of a racing clock. It is the classic Flowers for Algernon problem: how can Oliver go back to living his old life after the Cattons are done with him? The production design makes this tense spectacle organic. As the latest Catton charity case, Oliver’s time with the family could be running out, especially if Farleigh has anything to do with it.

Oliver shifts his persona to please others, but while he has some charms, they are not enough to get a permanent invitation. Patriarch Sir James Catton (Richard E. Grant, who is such a solid character actor that his physical expressions resemble Elordi’s as if they were real-life father and son) is easy to keep amused whether seated next to his son watching the latest exclusive pre-screening of upcoming movies, playing with his antique toys, or appreciating Oliver’s random ceramic knowledge.

“My parents, they’ve got problems.”

Former model Elspeth Catton (Rosamund Pike in a scene-stealing performance) cloaks her judgment and shallow preferences with a welcoming, confidant tone that disguises an eagerness to jettison any unpleasantness. Felix’s sister, Venetia (Alison Oliver in her onscreen acting debut), slinks around and observes the action pretending to be as self-assured as her brother and above the fray, but is actually in need of a soft spot to land. Carey Mulligan makes a brief appearance as Pamela, a house guest who feels like the more demure, soft-spoken, tattooed little sister of Tim Burton’s Red Queen (Helena Bonham Carter) in Alice in Wonderland (2010).

Saltburn is not as twisted and daring as the hype surrounding it portends, but it is hilarious, especially if second-hand embarrassment is your thing. Oliver deserves a gold medal in timing when to eavesdrop so he can overhear people talking about him. The dialogue is not so much witty as oblivious and invasive as they interrogate him about his humble origins. Even well-intentioned characters feel entitled to scoop up Oliver’s trauma like entertainment. The incongruous coupling of black-tie and evening-gown-clad partiers rapping, following a candlelit dinner party, suggests a wide-eyed decadent ignorance of how ridiculous the blue bloods seem.

“I don’t think I’ll ever go home again.”

Saltburn also features a lot of montages reminiscent of watching an extended mashup of Calvin Klein’s family friendlier commercials transitioning from their sexier roots. Cue playing tennis in formal evening wear or lounging around the estate as if they were on the beach. If reports of audiences clutching their collective pearls over male full-frontal nudity, masturbation, oral sex, baby-batter bathwater scandalizes you, then stay away from Yorgos Lanthimos’ films because they would devastate you.

This film has some simulated copulation so being shocked at mostly solo sexual situations seems titillating, but nothing more. The film never wanders close to NC-17 territory. It feels as if audiences are more surprised over the fluid, mostly homoerotic, starving desire and its implications more than anything happening onscreen. Fennell just visually spells out the implication of most idiomatic expressions such as someone being so fine that they would drink their bathwater, but the main point is being missed. These relationships are about consumption of people as possessions, not close, genuine relationships.

There’s a scene where Felix sulks because he thinks that Oliver and his sister are an item. It is the only time that Felix comes across as a bit of a spoiled baby, especially since he is straight and earlier found Oliver’s closeness stifling. He is not bothered at the prospect of his sister being a sexual being but rather discovering Oliver first. Felix wants to be the center of attention and cannot bear a moment away from the warmth of adoration. Because Fennell’s work is laden with pageantry, it’s easy to miss these lighter, competitive notes of entitlement. Or maybe it’s because Fennell does not see it as entitlement at all.

“Come to Saltburn.”

It’s the old trope of beauty equaling goodness and moral character. Most reviewers have already compared the film to a more overtly sexual The Talented Mr. Ripley (1999) or Keoghan’s reprisal of his role in Lanthimos’ The Killing of a Sacred Deer (2017) if the young terror learned how to liven up his dead eyes over the years, but Fennell’s film frames the wealthy as more blameless than one might expect.

Saltburn is a literal eat-the-rich movie with a regressive moral: social climbers are dangerous and not maintaining rigid class barriers endangers the deserving, well-intentioned though tone-deaf elite who grasp tightly to the power bestowed upon them from birth. Oh, and bisexual people are really sinister gay men with an agenda. The weird outsider should be kept in exile so be unrelentingly mean to him. It is easy not to notice because it looks so sumptuous.

“You can’t be trusted.”

A case can be made for Saltburn being the anti-Priscilla, another 2023 film that serves as a cautionary tale against living in a fantasy that shows two different types of Peter Pan figures: the tragic, but human Elvis who becomes a victim to his excess and Oliver, a man who wants to live in the Catton’s home forever. Fennell proliferates the fantasy of the deserving well-to-do from vulgar interlopers. The problem is not that upper-class people live a sheltered life founded on the invisible exploitation of others even if unintended, but rather the “wrong” person enjoying that world.

The elite’s surroundings are filled with red, warm-hued, welcoming seductive tones. There is no corruption or decay in this environment, and Felix’s impromptu tour of his vast home is as down-to-earth and welcoming as the average celebrity on “MTV Cribs.” History and literature are not remote concepts on those grounds. They are vibrant and living realities. The historical notion of the divine right of kings gets a makeover in the form of privileged kids cavorting on historically rich premises — they should be able to act with absolute power and be immune to any consequences of their actions. Connective tissue to Promising Young Woman, perhaps?

Further, they spend almost every waking moment with their families, including their parents, who may be permissive, but are present. It is a twisted type of wholesome family dynamic that eludes Oliver, a friendless loner wherever he roams. An audience may initially relate to Oliver, but by the end, they might be guiltily protective over the Cattons.

“I think I like you even more than last year’s one.”

And then there’s Farleigh. Race certainly poses a danger to the hierarchy and therefore the family. Farleigh functions as a prelude to the family’s extinction while simultaneously acting as an enforcer of the establishment. He uses his nationality to bring attention to Oliver’s trespasses, but ultimately is still the other and not to be trusted. Lady Daphne (Lolly Adefope) similarly upholds class standards while having no respect for her husband, James’ godson, Henry (Joshua McGuire).

Their race, outspokenness, and lack of deference is framed as more of an overt threat than Oliver’s grasp at class mobility. Race creates a shared, silent language between Farleigh and Saltburn’s servants. If the Black elite know their place and do not draw attention to it, they can belong. But a late comer and ambitious commoner like Oliver can wield the threat of exile and occupy a higher rung on the ladder. Racism becomes a tool of division that makes the upper class more vulnerable to attack from below.

The film’s underlying message is one of treason. A casual line about Henry VIII’s “spunk” remaining on one of the beds evokes the idea that preserving the Catton lineage equals protecting the state. Henry VIII created a whole new religion to maintain power. Menstruation and sperm are the bodily fluids which insure the future descendants of the British Empire. Felix is the last heir who can pass down the Catton family name, and Venetia holds the key to forming future powerful alliances.

“Now it’s time to take things up a notch.”

The body horror is not just revulsion over seeing bodily fluid being handled with enthusiasm in sex instead of as an inconvenience — a running joke is Elspeth’s disgust over moisture, but the elite being too careless and free with the elements that make them powerful, their reproductive bloodline. Barry’s sexual acts are not just about desire. It is treason. He is eliminating class and conquering them with his body politic, which explains why Fennell often shoots him as if he is a crouching succubus.

On that note, Saltburn is an over-the-top, unrealistic movie; a fantasy of a mostly bloodless revolution to displace, not dissolve, a hierarchy. It depicts a love/hate relationship between the social climbers and those above them, parasitic and leading to mutually assured destruction for both sides. If the film was realistic, the timeline would be more compact, and it would end like any “Law & Order” episode where law enforcement eyes the poorest person as the most suspicious, but no one has an ounce of self-preservation.

“This place…you know, it’s not for you.”

The lower classes, with butler Duncan (Paul Rhys) in the lead, are silent and obedient, which also contributes to their downfall since they do not speak against a visitor, even one that offends their sensibilities. Oliver has no need for people, even ones who serve him. As the movie unfolds, they begin to vanish while the estate remains well-tended without labor or supernatural forces maintaining the upkeep.

While Fennell may sympathize with the affluent and think that F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby is a horror story for the Buchanans, she makes a stunning and entertaining film with nostalgic needle drops, seamless performances and opulent wardrobe and locations. Her only flaw comes from within and is reflected in her twisted tale. The squeamish should skip it, and the prurient may leave it somewhat dissatisfied.

Saltburn is now playing in theaters. Watch the trailer here.

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Images courtesy of MGM. Read more articles by Sarah G. Vincent here.