Saltburn, Emerald Fennell’s second feature film, still has people talking weeks after it debuted in cinemas back in November last year.
The movie – which follows a working class Oxford University student in the 2000s who falls in with a charming, young aristocrat and his family – has been called “depraved, distasteful, disturbing” but also “an irresistible watch”.
The film has been well received by critics and audiences alike, but some scenes have certainly endured more than others. One of those scenes includes the much-talked-about bathtub scene.
Viewers will recall how Jacob Elordi’s character Felix masturbates to completion in a bath before disappearing, only for Barry Keoghan’s Oliver to steal in and secretly slurp up some of his rapidly depleting, semen-laced bath water.
The scene has had audiences transfixed, with plenty of over-the-top reaction videos sweeping TikTok, and now Elordi has spoken about it in an interview with YouTube channel Stream Wars.
The Euphoria star revealed that he was “excited” when he first read the scene in the script: “You don’t really see things like that in mainstream movies... so it was great that everyone was allowed to push those boundaries and expose people like that.”
This comes after Elordi told Variety (perhaps after a couple of drinks?) that he was “proud” his co-star got to drink him down:“I was like, ’Thank God, it’s mine... I was very proud. I was very proud to have Barry Keoghan guzzling it like that.”
It’s clear that Oliver Quick isn’t the only one keen to drink the bathwater of someone he admires. Candles, available on both Etsy and Amazon, have been made available, which supposedly smell like Felix Catton/Jacob Elordi’s bathwater.
Oh, and if you’re also so inclined, there’s a lovely cocktail recipe inspired by the scene floating around on TikTok, too.
In his Stream Wars interview, Elordi also revealed that he has tried to avoid audience reactions to the film, sharing that he attempted to “hide away” from them. The actor did, however, reveal that he went to screening in Brisbane back when the film first came out.
“It was unbelievable because everybody was engaged and sort of gasping at the screen and yelling at the screen... I haven’t been in a movie like that for a really long time,” he shared.
Recently, Elordi’s co-star Rosamund Pike described the making of Saltburn as “so erotic and so intimate and uncomfortable”.
When asked by Stream Wars about why he signed on to do the movie, Elordi praised Fennell calling her a “filmmaker through and through”. Of their initial meeting and conversation about the film, the actor said, “I just knew whatever it was it was something that I wanted to go down that road with her on.”
Saltburn is currently steaming in the UK on Prime Video.