Saltburn|Top reviews and ratings

Saltburn|Top reviews and ratings – Emerald Fennell directs an excessive film with original ideas that results in material with little substance.

By Megan Sauer

Emerald Fennell, who in 2020 made her debut with Beautiful Vengeance (a film for which she won the Oscar and the BAFTA award for best original screenplay), returns behind the camera and writing with Saltburn.

It’s a satire that combines excessive cinema with a naive provocation that captures the pretensions of the English aristocracy in 2007, as well as a beautiful exercise in style that contains an obvious and confusing metaphor for class struggle.

The producer and show runner of the second season of Killing Eve, and actress of The Crown, Barbie and Call the Midwife, is an Oxford University alum just like her character Oliver Quick.

He is a brilliant and misfit student with a difficult family situation played by Barry Keoghan ( The Sacrifice of the Sacred Deer The Spirits of the Island.

The cast is completed by Jacob Elordi as Felix Catton, Rosamund Pike as Elspeth, Alison Oliver as Venetia, Archie Madekwe as Farleigh, Richard E. Grant as Sir James and Carey Mulligan as Pamela.

It also has Linus Sandgren ( Babylon, La La Land: A Love Story ) as director of photography and with Anthony B. Willis ( Megan Beautiful Revenge ) as composer.

What is the movie about?

Struggling to find his place at Oxford University, student Oliver Quick is drawn into the world of charming aristocrat Felix Catton, who invites him to spend an unforgettable summer at Saltburn, the residence of his eccentric family.

Critics are slightly positive about the film: Fennell’s originality lies in her commitment to excessive cinema whose style stands out in the way it captures pretentiousness and the English aristocratic world.

Furthermore, the photography by Linus Sandgren and the music by Anthony Willis enhance the director’s images (whose themes on this occasion are violence, sex, desire, cynicism, sadism, cruelty and social classes).

However, the final act is parodic, discordant with the first part and predictable, and is full of ideas that are not clear.

The above means that despite the successes, added to the magnificent performances of all those involved and a mastery of dialogue appropriate to the genre, Emerald Fennell ‘s second film is beautiful but empty with a confusion of what the class struggle means.

What does Satburn’s review say?

BBC ‘s Nicholas Barber :

…if you view it as a lurid pulp fantasy rather than a piercing satire, then Saltburn is tremendously enjoyable.

It’s the dialogue and the performances that elevate it.

Oliver is amazed when he sees the priceless old masters on the oak-paneled walls of the house.

Every scene in which Pike, Grant and Mulligan compete to be the most unpleasant can provoke the same reaction in the viewer.”

Jordan Ruimy from World of Reel :

“If you’re looking for substance in Saltburn , look elsewhere. Like Fennell’s Beautiful Vengeance , this film may seem more of an exercise in style than substance, but it’s much more entertaining and requires more risks, some of which pay off.

It helps that the film’s dreamlike qualities are further enhanced by the colorful palettes of La La Land cinematographer Linus Sandgren (…) It all amounts to a guilty pleasure, one filled with those impeccably realized moments that generate a immense pleasure in orgiastic excess.”

Nick Schager The Daily Beast

Saltburn is adept at delivering dark, demented shocks, but its plotting is sometimes clumsy and there are few surprises regarding its ultimate fate.

Similarly, Fennell’s direction is elegantly off-kilter but unable to complement the material’s original thematic ideas…”

Marshall Shaffer of Slant Magazine :

“Whether sexuality, gender, class, age or race, there is hardly a hot-button identity issue that Fennell doesn’t invoke to amplify the stakes in an obvious metaphor (…).

The circle of eccentric characters, ranging from the bewildered Felix’s mother, Elsbeth (Rosamund Pike), to his free, mixed-race cousin, Farleigh (Archie Madekwe), are little more than his affectations, as the film prioritizes aesthetics over analysis.

Without more meat on the bones of these cartoons, Fennell’s upper-crust grotesque burlesque can’t draw blood.”

Maureen Lee Lenker of Entertainment Weekly :

“Saltburn is a provocative and violent portrait of revulsion and desire, exploring the ways in which intense desire can transform into something deeply disturbing.

Fennell understands that obsession isn’t simply about possession: Her ultimate goal is to completely consume the object of his fascination—licking the plate clean, so to speak.

The film is not for the faint of heart, but it is viscerally compelling and isn’t afraid to revel in its own elegant weirdness.

Its endless visual and literary layers will attract its ardent admirers again and again, because it is a triumph of the cinema of excess, in all its orgiastic and unapologetic splendor.”

Peter Debruge of Variety :

“Fennell’s debut promised an original, fearless voice and style. Saltburn certainly has attitude, but she has nothing new to say (…).

Faced with a sea of ​​bland and indistinguishable content, Fennell wants to make a good impression, adopting the strategy of teasing audiences with something they’ve never seen before.

It’s all part of the memeification of movies, and Fennell seems pretty clever about loading the film with one-liners and visual commentary.

These attention-grabbing devices are not enough to elevate Saltburn to the level of countless films she resembles…”

Richard Lawson Vanity Fair

“For some, that can ruin the Saltburn experience: one last wrong seasoning that stains the entire meal.

In my opinion, however, there is enough to savor in the first three quarters of the film (its fury, its sex, and its growing fear) that all is not lost.

How could it be when Pike, Keoghan, Elordi and the rest of the cast have such fine command of themselves, deftly deploying their physicality and pepperily delivering a parade of sour lines?

Elegant and intriguing, Saltburn is attractive for most of his career and therefore a stumble, even a big one, can be forgiven for most of him.”

Courtney Howard from The AV Club :

“With many films containing commentary on class disparity already in the zeitgeist, Saltburn ‘s sentiments are not much different and, worse still, he speaks out of both sides of his mouth when he describes the rich as hateful monsters dressed with luxurious designer clothes.

Fennell fails to dig beneath the surface to analyze his madness, and putting even a modicum of rootable interest in this protagonist (whether she’s for him or against him) leads to a confusing result. Maybe that’s the real problem.”

Yasmine Kandil from Discussing Film :

“There’s no doubt that Saltburn offers an engaging and entertaining mystery, but it’s hard to avoid the feeling that this story thinks it’s much smarter than it really is.

By fully utilizing its style and top-notch performances, the film desperately tries to mask the fact that it is simply a rehash of a class exam that fails to even formulate an argument for its motives.”

Álvaro Cruz Soleto from Diario La Comena :

“Saltburn is good moment by moment until the final act, where it plummets and everything you enjoyed about the play becomes empty and worthless.

Even so, I recommend going to see it to see its most shocking moments and to see its final shot, which belongs to a better film.

It is ironic that, in a play about class, excess, and betrayal, it is precisely an excess of spin and a misinterpretation of class struggle that causes Saltburn to betray herself.”