Emerald Fennell-Directed ‘Saltburn’ Conjured Images of Dark, Bloody Comedy, Says Cinematographer Linus Sandgren at Camerimage

Having won an Oscar for her gritty first film about a revenge murder, Emerald Fennell’s second movie, out this week, reminds us that she doesn’t believe in happy endings. Saltburn is about a vengeful college student who aspires to an even wider death toll.

The movie Saltburn is now in theaters and it features so many moments throughout the film that will leave you quite shocked that you’re even witnessing it on the big screen.

Deadline’s Read the Screenplay series, spotlighting the year’s most talked-about scripts, continues with Saltburn, the brutally dark satirical thriller written and directed by Emerald Fennell. The pic marks her sophomore feature, on the heels of the Best Original Screenplay Oscar winner Promising Young Woman. 

One of the best aspects of the democratization of creative media is the ability for just about anyone to write and self-publish a novel. We’ve seen so many authors in the modern era get their start with self-published books.

Ellise Shafer “Twilight” catapulted Robert Pattinson and Kristen Stewart to fame when it first premiered in 2008, leading the two to fruitful careers on screen. But who would play Edward Cullen and Bella Swan if the saga was rebooted today? According to Catherine Hardwicke, who directed the first “Twilight” film, Jacob Elordi and Jenna Ortega “would be perfect” as the star-crossed lovers.

Amazon/MGM’s Saltburn, the dark-comedy sendoff of British upper class, expanded nicely in a big jump from seven screens to 1,566, nabbing a spot in the top ten. The film by Emerald Fennell (Promising Young Woman) grossed $1.73 million for the three-day weekend and $2.7 million for the five-day Thanksgiving frame thanks to a strong core group of theaters.

Following her Best Original Screenplay win for Promising Young Woman, Saltburn, Emerald Fennell’s sophomore feature, presents a gothic tale of obsession and excess, starring Barry Keoghan as Oliver, a social-climbing Oxford student obsessed with the aristocratic Felix (Jacob Elordi). The multi-hyphenate Fennell also pops up as the pregnant Midge doll in Barbie and is co-penning the upcoming John Wick spinoff Ballerina. Here, she agrees to revisit some best memories, or, as she puts it, “rummage around those skeletons.”

British actress Eleanor Tomlinson has given a full explanation of why she has made a default decision not to film sex scenes, with very few, fully justified exceptions.

Barry Keoghan dares to bare it all in Saltburn. Now, director Emerald Fennell is opening up about the decision to include full-frontal nudity in the movie.

Saltburn, the new movie from Oscar winner Emerald Fennell, is now playing everywhere.

Emerald Fennell’s dark comedy Saltburn takes a massive jump from to over 1,500 screens today as Bradley Cooper’s Maestro, Hayao Miyazaki’s latest The Boy and the Heron, animated They Shot The Piano Player and other festival favorites launch awards season runs this Thanksgiving specialty weekend.

Jazz Tangcay Artisans Editor SPOILER ALERT: This story discusses major plot points, including the ending for “Saltburn.” Singer-songwriter Sophie Ellis-Bextor was already a fan of Emerald Fennell when she was approached about the use of her 2001 hit “Murder on the Dancefloor” in “Saltburn.” “I loved ‘Promising Young Woman,’” Ellis-Bextor says. But what really sold it to her was the pitch: “A naked man dancing through the rooms of a stately home…I’ve got a quirky sense of humor, and my main thing was, ‘I’ve got to see that.’” Set in 2006, Oliver is a student at Oxford University who becomes dangerously obsessed with the suave and good-looking aristocratic classmate Felix, played by Jacob Elordi.

There is no need for anyone to delicately dance around the reactions to “Saltburn.” Director and screenwriter Emerald Fennell is well aware her follow-up to the Oscar-winning “Promising Young Woman” is, for lack of a better phrase, somewhat polarizing. In fact, after speaking with her late last week it’s clear those sorts of passionate reactions (throw this writer into the growing “love it” camp) are exactly what she’s going for.

Jacob Elordi and Barry Keoghan‘s new movie Saltburn is out now in select theaters and there are some scenes that are definitely not safe for work.

Marc Malkin Senior Film Awards, Events & Lifestyle Editor SPOILER ALERT: This story contains descriptions of key scenes and storylines in “Saltburn.” Oscar-winning filmmaker Emerald Fennell’s new twisted thriller, “Saltburn,” includes several graphic scenes that have left moviegoers debating whether to be titillated or disturbed. “It gets under your skin,” Fennell told me Tuesday at the film’s Los Angeles premiere. “We just want to make something that makes people feel something.

SPOILER ALERT: This story discusses major plot points, including the ending for “Saltburn.” In the final moments of Emerald Fennell’s “Saltburn,” Sophie Ellis-Bextor’s 2001 song, “Murder on the Dancefloor” pumps out over the speakers, while Barry Keoghan’s Oliver dances stark naked through a grand estate house in the British countryside. “Everything is diabolical, but it’s exhilarating,” Fennell explained. “It’s post-coital, euphoric, solitary and it’s mad.” Cinematographer Linus Sandgren said the scene is about Oliver feeling as if he owns the place.

Rosamund Pike is stepping out to promote her new movie!

It’s a cool indie weekend when the new album by André 3000, New Blue Sun, has morphed into a “cinematic listening experience.” Variance Films is putting the experience, directed by Terence Nance, into three theaters in NYC (IFC Center), LA (Cinepolis Inglewood) and Atlanta (Tara).

Jacob Elordi, on a roll), a handsome member of the upper crust.And so do we. Sure, he’s a bit vapid, flaky and self-absorbed. Who cares? Let’s give Felix the benefit of the doubt, because he is attractive and rich!When Felix’s bike tire blows, smitten Oliver graciously lends him his ride, and a hot-lava friendship commences.

Ethan Shanfeld Paul Briganti describes the first week of filming “Please Don’t Destroy: The Treasure of Foggy Mountain” as “a miserable nightmare.” The movie, which follows the “Saturday Night Live” comedy trio John Higgins, Ben Marshall and Martin Herlihy as they hunt for hidden treasure, was shot primarily in North Carolina state parks — in the sweltering summer. “There were ticks and snakes, and it was over 100 degrees and very humid. It thunderstormed a lot,” Briganti, who joined “SNL” as a director in 2016, tells Variety.