#paula quick

[k-wame]

OLIVER QUICK & FELIX CATTON ↳ when the wife gotta teach you respek for your parents ↳ Saltburn (2023) dir. Emerald Fennell

[ollieapologist]

I really want to take a minute to explore Oliver's relationships with the women in the film and specifically his relationship with his mom since I don't really see it talked about much and it made such an impression on me when I first watched the film. As many others here have pointed out, one of Oliver's greatest personal strengths is his ability to discern and adapt to the expectations of those around him- he knows what role to play and when to play it, he's truly a social chameleon. Oftentimes this desire to perform the preferred role and conform to expectations of those around you is socially coded as feminine, traditionally women are labeled as and expected to perform as people pleasers. so it's incredibly interesting to watch Oliver continuously trying to shape shift in order to embody and reflect the desires of those around him and his absolute failure to handle the situation with his parents and specifically his mom is so fascinating and cringe lol.

It seems there are several different Olivers we see emerging around the women in the film. There's the wingman that exists to facilitate Felix's conquests and eventually rolls into his hookup with Annabel. There's the sexually charged but strange caricature of a dom we see with Venetia. Then there's what I'll call his "good boy" persona he puts on with Elspeth (and also during his first one on one encounter with Venetia). And lastly and perhaps most interestingly, there's a kind of petulant child persona we only see come out around his mother. All of these different masks Oliver wears serve to signify the same thing - Oliver's desire to keep the most vulnerable version of himself shrouded behind several layers of performance - highlighting his inability to do so around his own mother is super telling and important from a characterisation standpoint imo.

We briefly hear Oliver pick up his mother's phone call before the dead dad lie, but aren't made privy to the actual content of their conversation. Based on what she says during the birthday disaster scene, we can assume he does talk to her on occasion (oh he's the top scholar, on the rowing team, etc) but not as often as she would like (hence her having no idea where she could send a birthday card for him). In some ways he seems to allow his façade slip the most in front of her and he HATES it. This is clearly a moment of desperation for his mother and it's honestly sad. All she wants is to make Oliver and his new friend happy so maybe her only son will talk to her more, to include her in his life more, and instead clearly the vibe is fucked and it's a shit show by no fault of her own LOL. His dad's reaction to this reads almost as exasperation- like he's dealt with this tension between them before and is frustrated he has to meditate it. I think this is the most genuine moment we really see between Oliver and another person other than Felix in the film and it's....UGLY. Oliver behaves like a petulant little boy having a fit and it's clearly not even the first time he's acted up like this. I just know this gave Felix the ick LOL.

Big Oliver who doms Venetia, manipulates Elspeth, and totally disregards Annabel as a human being is actually just a moody, pathetic little boy who has probably treated his seemingly well intentioned mother like absolute trash. Scared, lonely little Oliver trying to distance himself from that version of who he is so completely that he's willing to entirely cut off his family just to escape it. I think Oliver deeply resents his parents and especially his mother (she was the one who talked to Felix on the phone, after all) for what happened that day between him and Felix; even though they did nothing wrong.

Actually I would go as far as to say his behavior with Elspeth after he kills her also speaks to this. Boys who have normal feelings and relationships with their moms don't wrap their murdered boy bestie's mom-turned-lover's arms around them immediately after killing her LMAO. I see that moment as one of rebirth but also one of a weird desire for maternal approval which is interesting because Oliver seems to *have* approval and admiration from his mom in the brief moment we see - like she's literally bragging about him, albeit in a strained way. So maybe it's that he was able to displace some of the resentment he felt towards his own mom and project it onto Elspeth while he killed her - making that dead armed hug more of a catharsis for him. Like an attempt to finally release and resolve that bitterness in some way. I don't know there's so much going on with this lol much to think about imo.

GOD months later and I'm still totally losing my mind over this movie LOL

[lylyisbored]

Yesterday I had an idea for an Saltburn au and it's driving me nuts bc I'm not a writer but I want to read this and here's the gist:

So there's a brazilian movie called The Second Mother that I watched ages before Saltburn and it's about a housemaid that lives with/works for a wealthy family in a big city (they're not rich rich like the Cattons they're upper middle class or smth), while her family lives at a small town in the northeast with the money she sends them and one day her daughter (who resents her for her absence) moves into the family's house to apply for an admission exam at a university there and tension arises.

Anyway, it's s a completely different film from Saltburn in theme, style and budget BUT I just suddenly remembered this film and started thinking what if Paula Quick was in the same situation? Working at the Saltburn state as one of the maids or even in a role similar to Duncan and she hasn't seen her children in years but acts as second mother to Felix, Venetia and Farleigh (Felix is her favorite ofc) then one day Oliver calls all of sudden after ignoring her calls for years to tell her he's moving in with her and is going to apply for Oxford.

So she asks Elspeth permission to let him stay for a while in a room next to hers and Elspeth is probably like of course honey it's no bother you're practically family and then Oliver arrives and omg she doesn't even recognize him he's so grown up (in the film she hadn't seen her daughter face to face since she was a toddler) but he calls he by her name instead of mom and he's polite but colder than she remembers and when he learns she lives at her job he's mortified bc he thought she had her own place and then sees the house and is absolutely gobsmacked bc he didn't expect this.

He eventually starts getting comfortable and questioning things which makes her nervous bc she doesn't want him to "forget his place" and at first Felix is a little jealous of him bc he's Paulas actual son and he's shy but not a pushover like he thought he would be, but eventually they end up getting on "like a house on fire" and Felix gets him to move to the room next to his therefore away from her and she starts worrying bc she sees the family starting to treat him as their new pet and she knows where that leads.

And what if the Quicks aren't even from another state but straight up Irish, so Oliver gets to have Barry's accent, (especifically from a irish small/rural town) or smth like it and I imagine this version of Oliver is still manipulative but, also more blunt and less willing to put up with shit. Ooooooh the possibilities!

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