Mister Tee wrote: ↑Sat Dec 02, 2023 7:46 pm
It may be after-the-fact rationalization, but Fennell has been quoted as saying that's in fact what she was driving at.
Nah....she fucked up...and I LOATHE this stuff as well...not only because there MUST be 200 sets of eyes going over these things for months upon months, but if you're gonna choose to be writer and director, (something I enjoy and respect greatly) then my anal retention viewing films expects MORE from you, for better or worse, and finding these fuck ups can only undermine overall quality....in my opinion.
Speaking of undermining, to Tee's dead on point...though honestly the MAIN reason we're all in this online "family" -> Academy Awards et al.
I was even asked by my IRL (as the kiddies say) Oscar pal, when given a choice amongst Holdovers, Napoleon, and Saltburn, upon finally having a second to see a film, why I'd choose the "loser" of that group? This comment immediately made me yearn for the days of yore, maybe it's just pre-Harvey(?), where being released was the only criterion of this vein required for consideration, not what month it was released.
Mister Tee wrote
First off, I think the "Welcome Class of 2006" banner was signalling the Fall arrival year; by the time they left for summer break, it would have been June 2007. Which was still before Superbad had even been released, let alone available for home viewing. Similarly, everybody's reading the new Harry Potter book, which wasn't in bookstores until late that summer. Fennell says she meant to imply that the rich got special/early access to all that stuff.
Felix getting Harry Potter early is funny and it works. Superbad... I can't make my brain overlook that they were probably still doing pickups and digitally erasing the lines in Jonah Hill's face.
Sabin wrote: ↑Sat Dec 02, 2023 5:46 pm Like, dude, Superbad came out in 2007! It wasn't on DVD in 2006 (unless her point is that the rich really do get everything).
It may be after-the-fact rationalization, but Fennell has been quoted as saying that's in fact what she was driving at.
First off, I think the "Welcome Class of 2006" banner was signalling the Fall arrival year; by the time they left for summer break, it would have been June 2007. Which was still before Superbad had even been released, let alone available for home viewing. Similarly, everybody's reading the new Harry Potter book, which wasn't in bookstores until late that summer. Fennell says she meant to imply that the rich got special/early access to all that stuff.
I can be very anal about this kind of thing. I was even slightly irked by Giamatti & Sessa in The Holdovers going to Little Big Man in Boston over Christmas break. The movie had opened by then, but only, I believe, in NY and LA. It didn't arrive in Chicago till mid-February, and it was standard back then for movies to open at the same time in the other major cities beyond NY/LA -- Chicago, Boston, Philadelphia, Detroit, SF, etc. So, I think they got this wrong, but it's the sort of thing only geeks like me would pick up on.
Mister Tee wrote
One of the sad things about our modern day film culture is the obsession with awards as the only validator, and, more important, the only commercial engine for movies that stray from the commercial genres. A movie like this just about has to be positioned as an awards contender...which it won't be, barring attention to Pike or maybe production design. But here it is, in the midst of more successful award-aspiring efforts, apt to get lost in the shuffle. This is a movie that, had it opened during the barren late Spring season, might have become a conversation piece, as the only movie around worth pondering. It's gratifying that as many here as have spoken up have made the effort to see it, but I wish its ambition could have yielded a higher gross, to encourage others to take the risks this film does. Even if those risks don't entirely pay off.
This is a terrific point. When Beau is Afraid was released, nobody had its fortunes tied to Oscar. Had it been released earlier in the year... well, I actually think it's chances might have picked up a bit, especially because while I don't think it's an especially deep film I do think it lingers in memory.
For example, I've seen two films from Fennell now. Both films are about relentlessly driven ciphers traveling through alien spaces (toxic masculinity and obscene wealth). Neither have much personality beyond their quests. A movie like Saltburn isn't really about class but about desire. Promising Young Woman might be about proving something but it's always sort of asking the question "To what limits?" and the movie largely follows that down the line. I do think Fennell is either very trained to modern TV expectations or it's just how she thinks. She needs to find that *THING* to hang a movie on. But I don't sense a lot of interest in culture, the world, etc. Like, dude, Superbad came out in 2007! It wasn't on DVD in 2006 (unless her point is that the rich really do get everything). Both movies feel a little too much like watching clotheslines upon which necessary scenes are hung. Both movies feel a bit like nods to the audience. Obviously, we all want money and power and would do anything to get it. It's just not much of a character journey. In Promising Young Woman, I don't really buy the idea that what Carey Mulligan plans *COULD* happen but it's consistent.
I saw this yesterday afternoon, and emerged with a reaction very much in line with Sabin's.
YES, SPOILERS ARE THE ONLY WAY TO TALK ABOUT THIS, SO LET THE UNINITIATED BEWARE
When I wrote about Promising Young Woman, I opined that Fennell showed her TV roots with the ending she gave the film. Current-day TV seems wedded to fan service/wrap-it-up twists more than fealty to character/observation. Promising Young Woman could have ended on a less conclusive/audience-stroking note and still had much the same impact, but opted for something with more whiz-bang to it. It didn't undercut the film, but it made it a slightly lesser thing than it had been till then.
This time around, what she does with her plotting DOES undercut the nearly two hours that had preceded. We'd spent most of the run-time following a striver: a guy so desperate to rise above his perceived station in life that he worms his way into situations, behaving deviously and obsequiously to try and firm up his spot. That he's a bit of a creep and a user in the process -- his fondness for bodily fluids underlining both -- puts us on our guard, but doesn't make him a villain. Even when we learn he's not the victim of excruciating life circumstance he's been claiming, but rather a comfortably middle-class sort, we can go with it a bit. (After all, we've observed -- from his treatment throughout the film, especially from that piercing "He's a scholarship boy who gets his clothes at Oxfam" -- that, in the view of the leisure class, anyone short of filthy rich might as well be a peasant.) I could even accept his panic over Felix learning his secret -- that it could drive him to the rash, fatal act.
But Fennell doesn't leave it there. Suddenly, we're shown that, far from being a high-amped Julien Sorel -- at worst an Tom Ripley -- he's the Dennis Price character in Kind Hearts and Coronets...plotting to take over a family's fortune step by psychopathic step. And we, the audience, have been suckers for giving him our sympathy -- even, at moments, feeling his pain -- along the way. This reveal -- which recontextualizes almost the entire story we've been watching -- trivializes the material; makes it into a parlor game -- an often amusing one, especially with its side order of class satire, but a far smaller thing than it appeared Fennell was going for.
And yet...I enjoyed a lot of the movie. It's got a lot of funny lines -- many, as all have noted, coming from the crisp deliveries of Rosamund Pike. (Though I have to confess, I missed some of the bon mots. Maybe the sound system was bad -- though I'd had no problem with the last several movies I've seen at this theatre -- or my hearing has suddenly done a nose-dive. Or it's the damn British accents.) There are a lot of pungent observations made in the margins -- the way the Oxford tutor is clearly more impressed by family connections of one student than by the academic superiority of the other; how Felix has inherited his mother's propensity for wanting to care for (metaphorical) lame dogs; how Pike's character, while professing that concern for the unfortunate, so readily accepts Oliver's rationale for wiping Poor Dear Pamela from her mind.
And there's just a ton of life to the storytelling. I've often cited Roger Angell's quote about the Reggie/Catfish era of the Oakland A's -- that "they're better than good; they're interesting". This movie falls into that category: whatever its flaws and disappointments, it's something I'd rather watch than 90% of what fills our movie screens.
Keoghan is a pretty perfect choice for this role; his odd looks can make one believe he's the poor unfortunate he poses as, but he always suggests an intelligence and cunning that only the obtuse could miss. That latter group, of course, includes much of the rest of the cast, especially including Elordi's Felix. He, too, is well-cast --for having those looks that are over-the-top handsome without suggesting vanity, but also for his amiable air that, only upon closer examination, suggests laziness and superficiality. Put it this way: Felix would deny he's a snob -- and, compared to most of his peers, he doesn't seem one; but, deep down, he is, in a way he'd never understand, because his tunnel vision life has enabled him to float past any consideration of the concept.
Giving it thought, it makes sense that Fairleigh is the only one truly attuned to Oliver's lethality; his own position as semi-striver makes him recognize a kindred spirit.
One of the sad things about our modern day film culture is the obsession with awards as the only validator, and, more important, the only commercial engine for movies that stray from the commercial genres. A movie like this just about has to be positioned as an awards contender...which it won't be, barring attention to Pike or maybe production design. But here it is, in the midst of more successful award-aspiring efforts, apt to get lost in the shuffle. This is a movie that, had it opened during the barren late Spring season, might have become a conversation piece, as the only movie around worth pondering. It's gratifying that as many here as have spoken up have made the effort to see it, but I wish its ambition could have yielded a higher gross, to encourage others to take the risks this film does. Even if those risks don't entirely pay off.
Really should just be called Saltburn Spoilers thread at this point because there are two conversations to be had about this film.
This is my experience of watching Saltburn. I was enjoying it in a surface way throughout most of it. It's a gorgeous sensory experience although (until the end) never quite as funny as I think it could be. Or outrageous. Transgressive moments aside, Emereld Fennell can't think of anything else for the rich to do than dress up and play racquetball. Throughout most of the film, I thought about the miraculous feat of casting that was Matt Damon in Ripley, wondered if Barry Keoghan was miscast. It's really hard to feel connected with him in the film and was just LOOKING at Saltburn, then I realized "Oh, he's a psychopath murder." Emereld Fennell was just fucking around, daring us to do what I was trying to do the entire time. So, it's all a lark then.
Reaction #1: it's a good time at the movies, although too stretched out at 130 minutes to be about so little. It's probably an important career move for Fennell to make to show how she can use money: on cinematography, production design, costume design, etc. It's a great thing to watch and experience. There is a visceral charge to much of it but I sort of think of it as a savvy career move, mixing Older Millennial music vibes with transgressive shock moments for the Tik Tok crowd (this is *THE* movie for Baby Tik Tokkers right now). It's full of quite good performances across the board. I don't see it getting any nominations but everyone is quite good.
Reaction #2: I'm torn on what Emereld Fennell's intentions are. Either she's trying to take the piss out of this *TYPE* of literary feast, dropping all of these references throughout only to reveal itself to be here for vibes only... OR she is trying to be transgressive by giving us this fawning gay protagonist, teasing us with the notion of what story we are going to see, but instead turning him into a total predator. It's probably somewhere in between. It's no accident that Oliver turns out to be from not just middle class but upper-middle class and I'm sure there's a ruthless observation to be made that the filthy rich can't tell the difference between anyone beneath them but either Fennell isn't interested in those kinds of things or can't. I'll be generous and give her a third option: this film has to set up a fair amount while appearing like it's doing nothing at all (Promising Young Woman is also a schematic work) so it's possible she just ran out of time. But either way, I know this: I have no idea what Saltburn represents specificially to Oliver as a character and that's a fuck-up. Saltburn as a place has no character behind the upholstery. It has no history that carries through the hallways. It's basically a movie about a void of a character who travels to a void of a place and comes to own it. As a movie, we're watching a dark joke. I just wish Fennell thought longer and harder about why it's funny.
This really seems to be a divisive film with some loving it and hating it. The audience I was with had that same reaction. I saw people shaking their heads. I heard people crying "Brilliant." I had fun. Rosamund Pike is very good and Jacob Elordi does a lot with that role.
Yes it’s Talented Mr. Ripley meets Brideshead Revisited meets, oh I don’t know, the maze in The Shining? But it’s more than a rip-off of any one of those and it is a heck of a lot of fun.
I’m going to focus on the performances:
Barry Keoghan completely goes there in this film, pushing his chameleon-esque trollish-ness to the limit to fully inhabit the main role of Oliver. And that final scene (where he somehow gets hotter and hotter for the thirty minutes leading up to it and then bam - hello!) felt fully earned to me. Apparently, Emerald made him do 11 takes of it (it’s one long tracking shot). Loved the “Murder at the Disco” playing out the film.
Jacob Elordi just has “IT” and after this year is on his way to becoming a full-fledged movie star. Did he recently hurdle past Zendaya and Sydney Sweeney or what happened? He is everywhere right now. In this movie, even when he’s not the focus of a scene, you can’t take your eyes off him and this role fits him like the proverbial glove.
Richard E. Grant was my choice to win the year he was nominated and he is deliciously perfect in this. You can’t really imagine anyone playing his part after you see it.
I don’t know how you could possibly leave Rosamund Pike off Best Supporting Actress this year. Not only does she have the best lines in the whole movie, but she feels so at home in this part, you actually think it’s just actually her. I loved Elsbeth's oblique denial and subtle insinuation that “Common People” was about her. Hysterical, especially if you’re a fan of the song and know the lyrics.
Carey Mulligan’s deranged cameo was also a highlight. My grandmother used to invite a “Pamela” to Christmas dinner every year and we would often never see nor hear from them again.
"The mantle of spinsterhood was definitely in her shoulders. She was twenty five and looked it."
Hard to fathom a more deserving cinematography nominee and winner....of which I'm fully aware are BOTH exceedingly unlikely.
Interesting dichotomy of opinion for the 3rd act there...and I suppose now having been a couple of days to "pick apart" in my brain...
I'm afraid it might fall more on the glib indulgence side, not to say Fennell is NOT a major talent now AND going forward, this was certainly something that tried, no? Makes me think of @uri , better to have tried and failed, than to be The King's Speech.
Though this may not have been what I had hoped it would be by the finale, it is a FULL ON written and directed and produced effort of film, giving it its fucking damndest, hurling about in a world of remakes and sequels and offshoots reboots and spinoffs and prequels and "reimaginings" etc.
**SPOILER ALERT**
Rosamund Pike had some LINES here...wow...haha...a little reminiscent of the darkest dark comedic dialogue from last year's The Menu. Keoghan is full entrancing and it will be a shame in a wildly loaded, big name slate for him to clearly be watching this one from the sideline.
The more I digest, the more I lean to your latter, Okri, though they have transferred for the second half of the film, to Saltburn, this is STILL 2006...and the lunacy behind the events following the deaths just doesn't ring true. Would love to see the director's cut of a film like this....as the span of time is cumbersome once Oliver is finally "bought off", how "long" did Sir James go on...how does he take over Elsbeth's entire life and have complete and unfettered access to her healthcare?
Just because he acts like a butler/house man from days of Tudor, why on EARTH would Duncan just bow down and accept the role of being Oliver's servant simply because he offed the rest....this is 2006 as I keep hammering...
Oh and Farleigh, yeah I'd bet not too long after his little dance...if the camera kept rolling....there'd be a fight to the death...
I have a lot more of course...but damn this woman is gonna win a Best Director Oscar someday....mark it down!
I cannot wait to discuss that third act. I'm not sure if that was chutzpah or just glib indulgence (leaning towards the former right now). I want to watch it again to see if it truly holds together.
Other thoughts
Linus Sandrgren does a terrific job lensing the whole thing.
The casting is phenomenal (I sorta expect BAFTA to go nuts). Keoghan and Pike are probably best in show (Pike gets some great lines and the third act is kind to her. And only her), but this is a great ensemble.
Sounds like what I like to call a candidate for the bottom five of the year's top ten films, if that.
I get the references to Brideshead Revisited, The Talented Mr. Ripley, and Teorema, but it also seems to be a bit like Harold and Maude in its macabre death references. Definitely one to see at least once.
Well, this one seems considerably more divisive than advance word suggested. The people who don't like it appear to be in danfrank's camp on Fennell. Praise for Keoghan, Rosamund Pike and Richard E. Grant. This might end up one of the weekend's disappointments.
