I wanted Triangle of Sadness to move faster until the rich people started vomiting. Then I was happy to stay. Ruben Östlund has spent enough time showing me how these passengers treat the crew that, when dinner starts coming back up, I’m prepared to be appallingly unsympathetic. Sunnyi Melles reaching for champagne to settle her stomach is the sort of decision I would advise, say, my adult children against. Here, I’d just love her to have another glass.
Östlund gives the guests time to believe they’ve recovered. They can compose themselves, attempt a conversation, take another sip. The next eruption interrupts an effort I have been watching them make, and each attempt to regain control is less dignified than the last. That’s why the length of the scene is material to it’s construction. He keeps finding more for these actors to do with their embarrassment. By the time Melles is sliding across her bathroom floor, the humiliation has become an unbelievably athletic undertaking. I am thoroughly enjoying myself at the expense of people whose claim to my sympathy was pretty weak before they sat down.
Which makes the dinner an odd place to look for the film’s most troubling ideas. I don’t have to reconsider much to enjoy it. I know these people, or at least I recognize the tropes in their public behavior well enough that the caricatures don’t seem like much of an exaggeration. Östlund’s staging is far more inventive than his selection of victims. The uncomfortable part of his comedy comes when he makes me wait on somebody who has a point.
The point is actually the opener of the film: Carl has one about the restaurant bill. Yaya said she’d pay, and now she’s letting him do it. Östlund prolongs the argument until Carl’s persistence starts to feel more objectionable than the thing he’s objecting to. I want them to get on with their evening, but to do that Carl has to accept an arrangement he doesn’t want. Harris Dickinson and Charlbi Dean make that impasse feel familiar enough to be exhausting. Paying the bill would be the polite way to end the scene. It would also settle the disagreement in Yaya’s favor. I’m glad they didn’t start vomiting this early in the film… but I wouldn’t have been surprised if they had.
Carl’s principles become easier to negotiate when there’s something in it for him. He benefits from Yaya’s career, and on the island he makes himself agreeable to Abigail because she can feed him. I don’t think Dickinson plays those relationships as a succession of cons. Carl seems capable of believing in whichever version of himself the circumstances require. That’s a more unsettling account of entitlement than any of the other passengers supply. I can dismiss the woman who orders the staff to enjoy themselves. Carl keeps finding explanations that sound reasonable… to Carl.
Abigail can do the work that keeps everyone alive, and I want to see that recognized. Dolly De Leon lets her enjoy making the others acknowledge it. But Abigail takes the biggest share of the food and uses her position to get Carl into bed. Her competence is real, and so is the abuse. When rescue threatens to return her to cleaning toilets, I can understand why she’d want to prevent it. Östlund has got me to the point where an escape from the island might feel like a loss, without making me believe she’s entitled to keep anyone there.
That’s why I wanted to end on De Leon’s face as she considers the rock in her hands. We know what killing Yaya would preserve for Abigail. Knowing that doesn’t settle what she’ll do, or make it any easier to watch her decide. Cutting to Carl running through the woods gives me the prospect of someone arriving to stop her. I would have preferred to be left there without his help. Östlund had made the waiting more difficult than the vomiting, and more than anything else, at the end of the film I just wanted him to see it through.