Jacob Elordi in Saltburn (Amazon Studios)

Ouch. That’s the instinctual response you might feel while watching Emerald Fennell’s follow-up to Promising Young Woman. That reaction comes from imagining the physical sensation implied in the film’s title (Saltburn) and from witnessing what happens on screen. With a lot of zip and zest, writer/director Fennell melds together a fish-out-of-water saga with a quasi-thriller and satire.

Fennell owes much of her storyline’s foundation to Patricia Highsmith’s The Talented Mr. Ripley. Though the tale of an outsider penetrating, in more ways than one, a luxurious cocoon is similar to Highsmith’s 1955 novel and two film adaptations, Saltburn has a brash and brutal tone of its own (not to mention its caustic barbs). Fennell deliberately provokes. Even if you predict what actions will occur—once you get on the film’s wavelength—it is still thrilling to see a filmmaker take risks, however self-consciously. She dares you not to clutch your pearls. You certainly won’t confuse her take with the other versions.

Oliver Quick (Barry Keoghan)—pay special attention to the surname—sticks out in his new surroundings at Oxford University, where he is a member of the future undergrad class of 2006. He’s from a broken, lower-class home with an alcoholic mother. One classmate describes him as “a scholarship boy who buys his clothes from Oxfam,” and what makes him stranger for many: He’s from Liverpool.

From afar, this timid wallflower catches a glimpse of the dashing golden boy Felix Catton in the dining hall. Jacob Elordi, perfectly cast as the school’s heartthrob, solidifies his status as a rising star. Here, and as Elvis in Priscilla, Elordi easily charms the camera. (If you need to confirmation of his star power, watch the red-carpet video from the Venice Film Festival when Priscilla premiered.)

The two students meet when Oliver, as a Good Samaritan, lends Felix his bicycle after the big man on campus has a puncture on his set of wheels. Thus begins a tentative friendship. Felix takes the shy nobody under his wings and provides Oliver an entrée to the posh set. Though the square-jawed Felix seems to have it all, there’s an inkling that he feels somewhat self-conscious about his privilege. The servile Oliver has a point when he notes that Felix is too rich to clean up his own messy dorm room.

Whether out of friendship or condescending patronage, Felix invites Oliver to be his guest over the summer at his family’s estate—Oliver is not the first pet project that Felix has invited to the manse. The real-life palatial Drayton House in Northamptonshire stands in for Felix’s family abode, Saltburn, where the Cattons have lived for centuries. (The actual estate has remained a private home, and by the looks of it, it’s in great shape.)

Oliver’s initial encounters with Felix’s vacuous, pleasure-loving family can be compared to the mixture of oil and water. Richard E. Grant, as the patriarch, and Rosamund Pike, as Felix’s mother, deliver their wry, myopic observations (no matter the subject) with panache, so much so that they will earn viewers’ sympathies, or at least focus. (Indeed, they almost steal the film from Oliver.) It doesn’t matter if what they say is witty; they believe it so. Unlike the smug and manipulative playboy of René Clément’s Purple Noon (1960), played by Maurice Ronet, the rich here, though clueless, are welcoming and fun. Just wear the proper black-tie attire for dinner. No wonder hangers-on lurk in the background, including Carey Mulligan, briefly, as Dear Poor Pamela, a ditsy, deadpan London socialite.

However, Oliver doesn’t quite fit into his new milieu—the most significant departure from the previous two film adaptations. He lacks the slick, boyish charm of Alain Delon in Purple Noon or Matt Damon in 1999’s The Talented Mr. Ripley. Instead, Oliver is viewed as a pet project who needs propping up. With his soft voice and hangdog mannerisms, Oliver will never quite fit in the aristo set. However, viewers become complicit as he gradually asserts his power over the intellectually vapid Cattons, as well as repelled by his actions, to become a permanent part of the family. Although the narrative is fairly straightforward, the last third turns into a muddle. Somehow, incidents hurriedly fall in place to move along the plot—an entire movie could have been made out of the final rushed 15 minutes.

Throughout, the film’s success relies on the sleight of hand of actor and MVP Keoghan (Oscar-nominated for his heartbreaking turn as a village idiot in The Banshees of Inisherin), who goes all out in this role. There are not too many actors that you would compare to Isabelle Huppert; there are moments reminiscent of her dark, fearless performance in The Piano Teacher.

Saltburn opens nationwide on November 24, though it’s decidedly not exactly holiday fare.