Review: Saltburn

_{Image via MGM}

For me, Saltburn was an easy sell. Look, I’d watch Barry Keoghan smolder at a brick wall for an hour and a half. But as soon as I discovered that Emerald Fennell of Promising Young Woman fame was behind Saltburn, I rushed out to see it.

Like Fennell’s prior work, Saltburn is a dark film in just about every respect, and I mean that in the most honest sense. It deals with obsession, loss, class imbalance, and love in ways most people don’t want to see. It does all this with aplomb through the clever use of an Oxford student navigating his way through high-strata social circles in 2006 (Keoghan), which gives it a decidedly unsettling “out of time” feeling.

To talk more about where it goes from there would detract from the film’s impact, but suffice it to say that Saltburn is captivating from start to finish, and part of that is due to the score by Anthony Willis. It’s completely unpredictable, and parallels (as well as elevates) the intensity that you’re seeing on screen. It accentuates the film and drives home the constant feeling of discomfort.

Alongside my historical praise for Keoghan, I have to give it to the rest of the cast for bringing this entire world to life. Richard E. Grant pops up every so often, does a job, excels at it, and then leaves: His turn as the patriarch of an exceedingly messed-up dynasty is exactly what it needs to be. Rosamund Pike once again puts on a marvelous performance as one of the out-there stewards of the imposing Saltburn estate, and Jacob Elordi (playing a fellow student) matches Keoghan’s intense energy with a nuanced performance. Absolutely everyone, including all of the minor characters, understood the assignment.

As one of my colleagues so eloquently put it: If I had seen Saltburn a decade or two earlier, it would have been a formative film in my life. It has flaws and a penchant for melodrama, but it’s a fascinating watch and part of the symphony of the resurgence of the “eat the rich thriller” genre that’s been thriving for the past several years. Consider me an Emerald Fennell devotee.