Psycho. #10

Please could you comment on the self congratulatory and smug tone of so much acting and ensemble filmmaking these days? I'm thinking mainly of Saltburn, but also — respectfully — Emma Stone and Olivia Coleman.

Before I attend to your question, I would like to dwell for a second on a no less important matter in my eyes: the constant misspelling of Colman by all and sundry. Why can’t you get it right? It is inexplicable to me! Type “Olivia Coleman” into Twitter and you will return scarcely fewer posts than for the proper orthography, so endemic is this misspelling. I once set up a Twitter account of my own to correct people’s mistakes on this subject — a laudable endeavour, I’m sure you’ll agree — before realising that such an account already existed: https://x.com/noeincolman. Why this particular misspelling? Nobody gets Tom Cruise wrong! Who’s out there writing “Emma Thomson”?? Get it right!!!!!

Now. I think you have actually picked up on something, but it’s quite hard to define, isn’t it? One man’s smug is another man’s “delightfully expressionistic”. What does this smugness consist of? How is it vehicled? Let’s start with where it comes from, because I have a readier answer to that, at least. I think I have found the point of commonality in the films and performances you mention; it isn’t hard, it’s staring us in the face. The thread linking everything you name is none other than……………………….. Yorgos Lanthimos.