When considering the grotesque within film and Bakhtin and Eco’s ideas on ‘Carnivalesque’ a recent example that came to mind was Emerald Fennells’ Saltburn (Emerald Fennell, UK, 2023). This film may not be an obvious case study for a laugh-out-loud comedy however the film uses black comedy and gallows humor as well as elements of thriller to have audiences squirming in their seats and full of nervous laughter.
The film includes many of Bakhtin ‘grotesque’ elements with many graphic scenes that focus on the physical body. Fennell doesn’t shy away from the perverse with body fluids, sex, violence, self-harm and death. The film leans into the ideas of taboo and desire and embraces physicals excess. The film leans into the absurd especially with the iconic bath tub scene, in order to unsettle but humor the audience. Eco writes about ‘freedom’ though comedy and this film allows it’s audience to find humor in the taboo, encouraging them to laugh at outrageous, rule braking but still tragic, characters. In one scene there is a discussion about Oliver’s family and rehab. The arrogant and out of touch upper class family have no idea about the north and make the comment about how “they probably don’t have rehab in Liverpool” so therefore “they just go to ruin.” This scene is objectively comedic, the audience are laughing at the stupidity and ignorance of the rich family but on a deeper level it is dark how out of touch they are.
‘By assuming a mask, everyone can behave like the animal-like characters of comedy.’ Saltburn’s lead Oliver (portrayed by Barry Keoghan) is throughout the film portraying different versions of himself, hiding his true identity with many different mask. During a murderous party Oliver even becomes an animal. Dressed with stag horns his character’s dark side becomes apparent as he murders his best friend.
A key theme of the film Saltburn is social class and the dynamics between upper, middle and lower classes in Britain. Oliver pretends to be a struggling member of the lower class, inverting his middle class status in order to manipulate the elite of the upper class. By the end of the film the social hierarchy has be toppled with lower class Oliver now possessing all the power just like at the carnival ‘kings are decapitated (that is, lowered, made inferior) and the crowd iscrowned.’
Saltburn (Emerald Fennell, UK, 2023)
Mikhail Bakhtin, “Introduction,” Rabelais and His World (Bloomington: Indiana, 1984), 4-30.
Umberto Eco, “The frames of comic ‘freedom’,” Carnival (Amsterdam: de Gruyter, 1989), 1-9.
I think the party scene where Oliver wears the animal costume is a really interesting example of this concept because during that party the hierarchy is disrupted because that is when he kills his wealthy and powerful friend, while other people are transgressing in the form of overindulgence of alcohol and drugs. It really well illustrates what Eco was talking about and shows how in carnival, things are turned upside down.
I like your point about Saltburn’s dissolving of hierarchy based on social class. Another (argubaly) carnivalesque piece of media that satirises social class is ‘Little Britain’. A key difference between the two however, is that Little Britain faces a high degree of scrutiny for the way that it attempts to parody social class distinctions in the UK, particularly the character of ‘Vicky Pollard’, the ‘chav girl’. Perhaps one reason for this is that Saltburn aims ‘up’ with its satirisation of higher classes, whereas Little Britain seems to aim ‘down’ by making fun of Britains working class population, which is arguably not in keeping with the spirit of the carnival.
It is interesting how excessive displays of bodily fluids and harm on screen are only shocking in the moment before becoming a running joke of pop-culture. The shock in the moment allows its own laugh, but the discussions that follow after the film are where jokes can really start to appear.