Triangle of Sadness

And so it came to pass that this year’s Cannes Palme d’Or was awarded to Ruben Ostlund’s  Poeme de Merde, abstractly enough titled Triangle of Sadness. 

That makes sense. For if there is any conclusion to be drawn from the current state of increasingly autocratic global politics, swelling injustice and a sober despair it’s this. if, as per the adage, the poor are always with us, the obscenely rich are always against us. And only growing in number and power. (As it happens, I saw this on the eve of the American election.)

The film is a satire of Swiftian decorum and anger. It opens and closes on Carl, a young stud trying to win the love of his Influencer partner Ya Ya. At the end he rushes through a forest in hope of saving her life. In both scenes she's defined as a selfish manipulator.

In the film's prelude several handsome young men are vying for a modelling job. Carl is instructed to “relax your triangle of sadness,” the mid-brow area that expresses emotion. “And open your mouth so you look a bit more available.” Here emotions are to be hidden or fabricated: Targeting such suppression of humanity, the film flaunts that title. 

In Chapter One Carl and Ya Ya quarrel over a dinner check. He bristles against “gender based roles” and “bullshit feminism,” rejects the “trophy [wife] shit” and is determined to make her love him. As “influencers” they are empty beauties selling their image. Despite her claim to be current, Yaya wants the traditional security of the “kept woman.” She expects Carl to pay her way.

In Chapter Two they enjoy a free yacht trip, spewing photos of themselves. It’s so luxurious a helicopter delivers a valise with three jars of Nutella. Another boat is despatched to take away a crew member fired when Carl complains the man appeared bare-chested. The model was disturbed by the genuine hirsute manliness. The ship offers to sell Carl an engagement ring for 28,000 euros.

The passengers are the creme de la crumb. Russian mogul Dmitri proudly declares his fertilizer fortune: “I sell shit.” So he understands the Influencers’ reduction to Image, when Yaya pauses the pasta at her mouth, determined to pose rather than eat. 

The British arms dealer Winston is less honest: ““Our products have been employed in upholding democracy all over the world.” He makes hand grenades. If democracy is held up here, it’s in the sense of the wealthy continually robbing the poor. But they also arm the underclass, as the pirates blow up the yacht with a grenade. As  Clementine observes, “I say, Winston, I believe this is one of ours.” The couple is a homey decline from the Churchills.

The cruise crew is a microcosm of social stratification. To pamper the clients a sparkling white staff are instructed to fulfil every client’s request, however absurd or impossible — in expectation of “a very. Generous. Tip!” In an insensitive imposition of “equality” Dmitri’s wife demands a staff girl join her in the hot tub: “Everyone is equal!. I command you, enjoy the moment!” Of course, one would not command an equal — and could not command enjoyment. 

From the crew’s orgiastic celebration of “Money Money! Money” we cut to the uniformed workers, quiet in their quarters, the hidden but vital Asian and Filipino menials. When the entire crew submits to the water-slide “pleasures” that the Russian woman ordered, the first signs of a serious storm appear. Nature seems to respond to that social disordering.

In what follows, satirist Ostlund almost manages to out-Salo Pasolini. He floods the affluent with effluence. The excrement that studded the language in the first chapter here materializes in force. First the gourmand passengers start vomiting all over. Then comes diarrhea not just human but mechanical. The toilets overflow, flooding the floors. 

        Against the diners' growing nausea the well-trained staff can only prescribe more eating. Cutting back, self-denial, are alien concepts in this world, even when the luxury dining room turns vomitorium.

As the filthy rich are reduced to this materiality a demented German woman continually repeats “In the clouds” — as if only the demented can so locate the human in the heavens.

The ship’s captain has been secluded drunk so far, clearly unable to bridge the gap between his duties and his politics. For he’s a self-styled “shit socialist.”  When the others ate smoked octopus he ordered a hamburger and fries. He and the Russian fertilizer mogul retreat to his cabin. The American Commnunist and the Russian Capitalist regale each other by swapping Socialist jokes. 

Congruent with the shit-flood, the captain demands on the PA “Stop the bullshit and pay taxes.” Then “You’re swimming in abundance while the rest of the world drowns in need.” As played by the affable working-class persona Woody Harrelson, the captain sometimes seems the director’s spokesman: “I’m not angry with you. I understand that your greedy behaviour is just a way to preserve . . . that you’re rich, filthy rich.” The excrement connotes the filth of the self-serving rich. They are, after all, flush with money. 

The captain concludes with his allegation that his government was behind the murder of Martin Luther King, Malcolm X and the Kennedy brothers. As if to wreak poetic justice that’s when the boat of pirates appears, blowing up the yacht, which at this point looks like the battleship of the captain’s vision.  

In Chapter Three: The Island, the few shipwreck survivors find their social structure reversed. The Filipino toilet manager Abigail raises herself to Captain because only she can catch fish, clean them and start the fire to feed the others. She also takes Carl away from Ya Ya, buying his romance with — an apt parody of phallicism — pretzel sticks. 

In contrast to her efficiency, one of the men struggles to kill a donkey by bashing its head with a rock. That may provide the clue to how to read the closing scene with Abigail and Ya Ya. The open ending allows the viewer’s choice whether the working class can sustain its hardwon status or will yet again cede it to the less capable but habitual authority. This ambiguity echoes the question in the prelude: “So is this runway casting for a grumpy brand or a smiley brand?” The three characters also form another triangle of sadness, however we decide Abigail's last act.