Triangle of Sadness
Masterful, grotesque satire in which Ruben Östlund (THE SQUARE) hilariously mocks the super-rich on a heady cruise. Winner of Cannes' Palme d'Or.
Mocking the rich and famous is something you can leave to Swedish master filmmaker Ruben Östlund. He already did so successfully in 2017 in THE SQUARE, with which he won his first Golden Palm. In TRIANGLE OF SADNESS, which won the Palme d'Or at this year’s Cannes Film Festival, the director sets his sights on the world of Instagram models and super-rich cruise tourists. The film’s title refers to the wrinkle between the eyebrows, the ‘triangle of sadness,’ which rich people like to have removed. A cynical metaphor for our society obsessed with beauty and outward appearance.
In the film, celebrity couple Carl and Yaya are invited on a luxury cruise with a motley crew of wealthy passengers and a quirky, alcoholic, Marx-citing captain. At first, everything looks like the perfect Instagram post, but a violent storm is brewing. The cruise ends catastrophically, and the couple is stranded on a desert island with a group of billionaires and a cleaning lady. In a struggle for survival, the hierarchy is turned completely upside down. In painfully poignant fashion, Östlund denounces the human behaviour of rich people. In the finale, after an extensive laugh-out-loud workout, the film shows how our decadent Western civilization is literally going under.
TRIANGLE OF SADNESS features Hollywood veteran Woody Harrelson and Harris Dickinson, among others, alongside South African actress Charlbi Dean, who died unexpectedly in August at the age of 32.