Saltburn.

A movie that boldly asks, "what if The Talented Mr. Ripley was dumb?"

It probably shouldn't be that much of a surprise given her upbringing that Emerald Fennell (daughter to "the King of Bling") is not the most class-conscious person around, but this movie demonstrates her thoughts don't seem at all to go beyond "rich people are a bit callous and poor people wish they were rich." Not only do poor people wish they were rich, but they will go to sociopathic lengths for it. I can't imagine what she thought when she saw Parasite. There's something interesting to the idea the film works better being about parasocial relationships that Fennell has suggested in some interviews, but the setup of the text does not support the comparison there nearly as strongly as the more obvious class allegory (honestly the other Elordi film out right now fits better as a film about parasocial bonds).

I'd be willing to let the movie pass as exploitation were it not for how ponderous it felt during many of its bigger scenes, with an overbearing score to try to provide gothic overtones. Any attempt at provocation is done so slowly and with little development that it just feels entirely empty. I suppose Fennell thinks bodily fluids in a movie makes it edgier, and therefore cooler. Maybe it plays edgier since we're in the most sexless period of cinema, but here it just feels like a middle school teacher who slips the word "damn" every once in a while so you know they're with it. You can't fumble your class commentary and not even back it up with some proper freaky fun.

The cinematography looks very nice, but again in an entirely superficial One Perfect Shot kind of way. Is she saying anything through the shot selection? Not entirely, the aesthetic of much of the film is the same as nostalgic Tumblr posts. There is a motif with mirrors going on that is pretty on-the-nose and becomes less frequent as the film grows more and more transparent with its lead character (Fennell sure does love endings that are almost entirely expository). I will give credit to the choice in aspect ratio, which does proper justice to the multiple instances where the audience is acting as voyeurs to the characters, a really good choice.

All the acting was terrific, though. Keoghan as a lead gets plenty to do and is game for everything, Elordi imbues proper movie star charisma without which the whole premise of this movie would fall apart, Pike has been the queen of black comedy since Gone Girl now and never fails, the whole cast from top to bottom is uniformly excellent. I wish it were in service of better material.