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In my effusive review of Emerald Fennell’s first film, Promising Young Woman, I suggested that she was a writer/director whose work put you in mind of other film makers but in the most positive way. Mostly in that case it was Hitchcock I was speaking of, which was a bold comparison but one she was able to stand up to. Of course I only had one movie to go on at that stage but now she has released her sophomore film I stand by it. Fennell is a director with the most precise and brilliant cinematic literacy and her work takes the conventions and traits of what the medium has given us before yet plays, extends and exceeds them with great artistry.

The work that Saltburn put me in mind of includes Brideshead Revisted (which is explicitly referenced), Rebecca (Hitchcock again) and Kind, Hearts and Coronets. Don’t read too much into that selection in terms of the plot but there are elements of each of them in this film about a young working class man who is invited to spend the Summer with a rich family in their huge country estate and is both manipulated, unnerved and covetous of what he finds there.

In this case though, the story isn’t quite there to match. It’s a high benchmark so take this in that context but Saltburn does not have the power of Promising Young Woman. It’s protagonist is equally flawed but not as likeable and crucially this does not have the same clear and essential message. Also, where the shocks in Promising Young Woman were unfailingly there in support of its razor sharp narrative, the shocks here (and there are some decidedly uncomfortable ones) sometimes feel like they are included purely for their own sake. Great as his performance is, I also couldn’t shake the feeling that lead actor Barry Keoghan was a bit miscast, whereas I can’t imagine anyone but Carey Mulligan playing Cassie in Fennell’s debut. Mulligan cameos here as well and by contrast I’d have imagined almost anyone other than her playing that part. She still nails it.

It’s not that Fennell loses sight of her audience, the movie still finely walks the line between telling viewers what they need to know and trusting them to fill in the blanks, but the whole thing just doesn’t quite come together with the right amount of cohesion and pacing.

Still, Emerald Fennell remains an auteur who takes what others have done and repackages it with expertise and Saltburn is recommended viewing. Just in this case there was one particular director she couldn’t measure up to; herself.

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The Talented Mr. Ripley Factor:

As well as the influences already mentioned there is a more than a little bit of Patrica Highsmith in here as well, as another female writer tells tales of deception and self denial among the sun drenched rich. Highsmith was certainly someone committed to gender equality, as her book The Price of Salt and its film adaptation Carol show, but she also wrote strong and complex male characters, Tom Ripley being the best example. Now we can see that Emerald Fennell shares these sensibilities and skills. As much as I wanted another feminist parable (Fennell also wrote on Killing Eve) I am pleased that she has stepped away from being pigeon holed.

In terms of gender representation in the film, there are two key female characters and they play essential roles but this is a male-centric story. As such there is some examination of toxic masculinity but certainly not in the same way as in Promising Young Woman. There is also male nudity in the movie but none involving women, when narratively there is more justification for the latter than the former. This in itself feels like some kind of statement.