In Emerald Fennell’s *Saltburn* (2023), the film ends as a complete inversion of power, wealth, and survival. While nearly the entire ensemble cast suffers a total loss, one character systematically strips them of everything to end up in a position of ultimate material gain.
### **Who ends up better off?**
**1. Oliver Quick**
* **At the Start:** Oliver is an isolated scholarship student at Oxford who presents himself as a tragic "have-not." He lies about having a deceased father and a drug-addicted mother to gain sympathy, but in reality, he is from a stable, middle-class background.
* **At the End:** Oliver is the sole owner of the Saltburn estate and the entire Catton family fortune. By the final scene, he has successfully manipulated his way into the family, eliminated every heir, and inherited the property through a calculated long game spanning over 15 years. He is seen dancing naked through the halls of the mansion to "Murder on the Dancefloor," symbolizing his total triumph and possession of the world he once only watched from the outside.
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### **Who ends up worse off?**
The entire Catton family and their social circle are destroyed, either through death or social exile.
**1. Felix Catton**
* **At the Start:** The charismatic, wealthy, and universally loved "golden boy" of Oxford.
* **At the End:** **Dead.** After discovering Oliver’s lies about his family, Felix tries to end their friendship. Oliver poisons Felix’s drink in the Saltburn hedge maze, leading to his death.
**2. Venetia Catton**
* **At the Start:** Felix’s wealthy, albeit emotionally fragile, sister.
* **At the End:** **Dead.** Consumed by grief and the realization that Oliver is a "moth" destroying her family, she confronts him. Oliver leaves razor blades on the edge of her bathtub, encouraging her suicide; she is found the next morning having slit her wrists.
**3. Sir James Catton**
* **At the Start:** The eccentric, wealthy patriarch of the Saltburn estate.
* **At the End:** **Dead.** After Venetia's death, James senses Oliver’s parasitic nature and pays him a large sum of money to leave forever. Years later, he dies (ostensibly of natural causes, though the film hints at his spirit being broken), leaving the estate to his wife, Elspeth.
**4. Lady Elspeth Catton**
* **At the Start:** The glamorous, vain, and socially insulated matriarch.
* **At the End:** **Dead.** After James’s death, Oliver orchestrates a "chance" encounter with a lonely Elspeth. He moves back into Saltburn and spends months "caring" for her as she withers away from a mysterious illness. On her deathbed, after she has signed the entire estate over to him, Oliver reveals his full plan and kills her by pulling the plug on her life support.
**5. Farleigh Start**
* **At the Start:** Felix’s cousin who lives a life of luxury at Saltburn despite being financially dependent on the Cattons.
* **At the End:** **Exiled.** Oliver frames Farleigh twice—first for the theft of valuable artifacts and later for providing the drugs that "accidentally" killed Felix. Farleigh is permanently cast out of the family and lose his financial lifeline, ending up with no status or inheritance.
**6. "Poor Dear" Pamela**
* **At the Start:** A "friend" of Elspeth staying at Saltburn to escape a dangerous situation.
* **At the End:** **Dead.** After Elspeth grows bored of her and asks her to leave, Pamela is found dead in London, reportedly by suicide. Her death is treated as a minor inconvenience and a "fashionable" tragedy by the Cattons, foreshadowing their own disposability.