Fiery ‘SALTBURN’ Glows With Psychosexual Heat, Palace Intrigue

In her second feature, writer, director, and producer Emerald Fennell digs her heels deeper into the themes of power dynamics and the consequences of privilege that she explored in 2020’s explosive Promising Young Woman, this time folding in palace intrigue by moving the action to the lofty estate of a family of aristocrats at the eponymous Saltburn. A decadent feast for the senses, Fennell’s sophomore feature calls to mind a tale as old as time framed through a modern lens: an unassuming Oxford scholar is allured by the corrosive power of wealth, finding himself sucked into a vortex of desire, greed, and materialism. It’s Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby with the hyper-modern visual high-shine of Euphoria and the cold calculation of a Bret Easton Ellis novel, plus a splash of the wealthy ennui found in a Sofia Coppola film.

We start with Oliver Quick, played with devilish precision by a Barry Keoghan at the height of his skillset. Oliver is at Oxford on a scholarship. Studious to the point of obsessive. Largely friendless. A human study in the chameleon effect. When Oliver forges a chance friendship with the affable, outgoing, and ultra-wealthy Felix Catton (Euphoria’s Jacob Elordi), he nestles into Felix’s innermost confidence, cleverly manipulating situations to ensure his good standing. Everywhere Felix goes, Oliver follows. Whatever Felix does, so too does Oliver. A dog to his master, browbeat by the pretenses of Oliver’s elitist social circle but never deterred, Oliver coils.

So it goes until dear Olly secures a summer invitation to Felix’s estate where he meets the rest of the Catton clan, including depressive, chain-smoking sister Venetia played by Alison Oliver, intriguing every minute she’s onscreen; the Pollyannaish Sir James, played by Richard E. Grant, perfectly cast as an outwardly cheery aristocrat desperate to avoid hard truths; and Rosamund Pike’s Lady Elsbeth, a mercurial and easily-manipulated socialite. Oliver worms his way into their graces, finding a higher calling in Machiavellianism, scheming his way through Saltburn in a series of high-wire social politicking, drama engineering, and shadowy power plays.

Filled with ideas to the verge of bloating with them, Fennell’s film digs into the contradictions of control, lust, friendship, and power, all through the lens of wealth and privilege. Saltburn begs us to consider what it means to come into the bosom of something as code-shifting as vast, almost unimaginable wealth and then picture a life deprived of such excess. For some, like Carey Mulligan’s Dear Poor Pamela, to be stripped away from the teat of luxury is no better than a death sentence. To others, like Archie Madekwe’s Farleigh, proximity to such breeds cruelty and indifference.

Oliver is the natural evolution of their insatiable greed – a wolfish leech is sheep’s clothes. For their sake, the truly privileged are portrayed as feeble here, their vulnerabilities preyed upon with sex and words, sensual verve rattled like a saber at their creaky moats. Fennell’s luxurious style presents a facade of an enviable world, which gradually reveals a darker reality beneath, echoing themes of the surreptitious ills of human nature and their taste for living deliciously. Hers is a deeply devious film and as the plot shifts from a simmering sexual drama to a privilege porn hangout film to a blood-stained thriller, it finds a way to have its cake and eat it too, delivering genre thrills amongst themes of great societal rot. As the famous aristocratic phrase goes: let them eat cake.One cannot understate just how good Keoghan is here. Cozying up to one of the Cannons, he shares in a devious whisper, “I’m a vampire.” And he is. A vampire in a world where vampires don’t exist, feeding off the charity, goodwill, and – quite literally – blood and bathwater of others. You’re left equally fawning over and revolted by Oliver; dazzled by his scheming, stunned by his cruelty, aroused by his raw sexual power. As a portrait of a man realizing the gross power he can wield over others, Keoghan delivers a can’t-look-away performance in a young career already full of them.

Filmed in a boxy 1.33:1 aspect ratio, Saltburn gives the impression of a voyeur peering into secret rooms and gated grounds intent on keeping them out. Not by accident, this framework mimics Oliver’s POV. The lifestyles of the rich and the famous invariably invoke envy, disdain, white hot angry. Fennell invites audiences to leer alongside Olly and draw their own conclusions about who is really in the wrong. Working with accomplished cinematographer Linus Sandgren, every single frame is a painterly work of art. From Suzie Davies’ austere set design to the overindulgence of Sophie Canale’s costumes, Fennel’s images reflect a haze of opulence, depravity, and even boredom. To want for nothing is a dull sport. It all comes together as a tantalizing feast for the senses, a maximalist epicurean delight, bound by an outstanding ensemble cast and penetrating themes.

CONCLUSION: Emerald Fennel’s venereal second feature is an explosive satire of inheritance and deception framed as a simmering psychosexual thriller. The entire cast is wonderful but Barry Keoghan proves himself as a truly one-of-a-kind talent.