After winning the prestigious Palme d’Or at the 2022 Cannes Film Festival – Ruben Östlund’s second on the bounce – the supremely hilarious satire, Triangle Of Sadness arrives to wide audiences in the UK. The supremely funny, very black comedy is a stand-out of the year, a howl-at-the-screen feature that’ll have you grinning throughout, and also, maybe, reaching for the sick bucket.
The film opens as it means to go on – a fashion model audition where Harris Dickinson’s immensely beautiful Carl is seen flexing his muscles, both literally and figuratively in front of a seemingly hostile panel – his ‘triangle of sadness’ – the ‘worry-wrinkle’ area above his eyebrows not working for his critics. He’s ‘going out’ with fellow model Yaya (the late Charlbi Dean in her final screen role), who is much more successful professionally than he is. An excruciating scene where Carl is expected to pick up a pricey restaurant bill is both hilarious and brutally uncomfortable follows, a set-up for the main volume of the film set aboard a luxury cruise liner.
Yaya and Carl are present on the ship in a professional capacity, the former promising to create social media posts, something the duo collaborates on as an influencer power couple. They are just two of many characters aboard the lavish boat. Woody Harrelson plays a washed-up, constantly pissed – and very absent – Captain, who spends most of his time drinking his life away in his lower-deck cabin leaving head hospitality steward Paula (Vicky Berlin) to pick up the pieces and tend to their very high maintenance guests. They include a Russian Oligarch, Dimitry (Zlatko Buri?), a stroke-stricken German lady whose vocabulary is limited to just three words – “in der Wolken” – “in the clouds”, lonely millionaire Jarmo (Henrik Dorsin), and also a stand-out Dolly de Leon as Abigail, a lowly cleaner aboard who sees the tables turned in the hierarchy of social standing when the ship sinks and they all get marooned on a desert island.
I’m giving a lot of the plot away there, but this is all seen in the film’s trailer, above, but the joy to this film are the many, very well-written and executed scenes that are structured together throughout – and, of course, the many fine performances contained within. Harrelson is the big name attached to the project, and is, of course, wonderful as Captain Smith. Dickinson, so good in his break-out Beach Rats, is also on fine form here, those Bruno-esque initial moments where we are introduced to his character lodged firmly in the memory as a tale-away from the fillm. Then, there is the equally fine Dean, who sadly passed away this August following the film’s Cannes premiere. She is excellent as Yaya, and the industry has lost one of its future big stars.
While the film itself is a little bloated – the 150 minutes might put some off – it rattles along at a relentless pace through many laughs and a very, very memorable middle section that’ll either have you riding with it or jumping overboard and running for the exit.
Easily Östlund’s most accessible work, and it might also be his best. It is certainly the most enjoyable.
Triangle Of Sadness is release in UK cinemas from 28th October.
Triangle of Sadness
Summary
An absolute riot of a movie from beginning to end. Clever, and indeed very funny, the film is bound to feature highly on ‘best of the year’ charts as we eneter the final quarter of 2022.
