Xtreme Vogue Mumbai Desk: Komal Qureshi
Star Cast: Harris Dickinson, Charlbi Dean, Dolly De Leon, Zlatko Buric, Iris Berben, Vicki Berlin, Henrik Dorsin, Woody Harrelson
Director: Ruben Östlund
What’s Good: Eating Off The Rich is a phenomenon cinema is actively exploring now. Ruben with his cleverly outlandish satire takes a dig that is so bold and unfiltered that you cannot watch it without cringing at least once.
What’s Bad: By the climax the film kind of gets into the repetitive circle only to be redeemed by a gut- wrenching open ending.
Loo Break: You aren’t allowed to because you will end up missing something.
Watch or Not?: Watch it for how clever the movie is while being a spoof and also make sure the audience takes home a very disturbing movie with them.
Language: English (with subtitles).
Available On: In Theatres Near You.
Runtime: 143 Minutes.
User Rating:
An influencer celebrity couple joins a group of the super-rich elite on a yacht. A turn of events leads to some tragic incidents and they are now stranded on an island. How the power dynamics change with the conditions.
Script Analysis
The outlandish life of the elites if seen from a distance wide angle is actually funny and bizarre. Be it the very ‘basic’ need for mineral water or even their gest to keep anybody from the classes lower to them to the boundary. The obsession with money and the power that come with it kind of makes them all look funny because while they can afford to be dumb, they do not realise they act like one. When a filmmaker encompasses all of that while also highlighting all the evils in them, it all just makes for a very intriguing watch. Example The White Lotus.
Writer Ruben Östland, who has two Palme d’Or, the highest honour at the prestigious Cannes Film Festival and now is also the president of the same, is known for his unique satirical voice that brings out the most wretched and depraved side of the people referring to the multiple vices in them. With Triangle Of Sadness, he tries to choose two people with different political voices and make them fall in love with one another. The politics between them is of gender where the woman, Yaya (Charlbi), mends the definition of equality to her comfort and Carl (Harris) fights just that. Together they are at war of genders trying to always be the best for each other while not allowing each other to even look around. Their world is about creating a fake identity. It begins with covering the triangle of sadness between their brows with Botox, to finding love in materialistic things.
When this couple fighting over a dinner bill gets a paid Yacht tour, they get together and try to portray their most beautiful side with bikini and beach shorts involved. The yacht is a jungle because it houses not one but multiple rich folks so obsessed with their money. Östland finds the evil in the people on board and highlights it as their comical trait. These are filthy rich folks standing on the grave of the have-nots they enslaved all over the years and now eat the money off their fossils. A British couple is sad about the fact that the new government has made their business difficult. They deal in landmines and hand grenades. Yes! That’s the outrageously attitude we are talking about.
The filmmaker highlights the evil in everyone as a Russian man Dimitry played by Zlatko quotes world leaders who have spoken about political ideologies and the class divides over decades. When he is done putting the spotlight on the buffoonery of the elite, he gives them a moment to marinate themselves into ultimate vanity and then creates a situation where they all roll and cover themselves in their own dirt. He purposely writes this scene so dirty that you have to maybe chose to turn your face away. He then moves the entire set up to an island where he manages to change the power dynamics. Now a toilet manager is the only person who has survival skills so she becomes the leader.
The rich of the world are now serving a toilet manager whom they could have not even noticed in the normal world. The is so much critique of the way of living and the uselessness of the elite that it all lands just right. It is by the gut-wrenching climax that the film dips a bit as it gets into a repetitive loop. Maybe it has a purpose because the way it breaks into the final act does hint the same.
Star Performance
Harris Dickinson as Carl is so controlled in everything that he does. The actor has a restrained trait to his part and he brings that on screen so well. There is so much to see even in the expressionless modeling gaze that has slowly even slipped into his normal persona. The late Charlbi Dean is amazing as Yaya as she represents a community that is growing around us and making us fall prey to unrealistic standards of living.
Woody Harrelson and Zlatko Buric together have such brilliant timing. They are only having a conversation in a world that is unsettling and about to break. Such a pinching representation of the times we are in where people chose the internet to do unnecessary debate while the world continues to hit rock bottom after rock bottom.
Dolly de Leon as Abigail is used so cleverly. She is always in the film but not really until the camera decides to focus on just her when she takes the powers in her hands. Such a brilliant way to give a character shape and an actor her time.
Direction, Music
Ruben Östland as a filmmaker finds so much comfort in absurdity that he never asks how much is too much? even once. And It actually works in his favour almost all the times. Here is doesn’t shy away from showing you the dirtiest of the dirty sides and that too with precision. Triangle Of Sadness is of course metaphoric but also quite simple to understand. Everything falls in place so nicely for the movie and it all works together just right.
The Last Word
Triangle Of Sadness is a spoof about the elite and the absurdity they represent the Ruben Östland style. Watch it if this is your genre, give it a try even if it isn’t.
