Emerald Fennell’s acclaim as a filmmaker is much bigger than the substance of her films. Having been the showrunner of the second season of “Killing Eve,” Ms. Fennell broke out with “Promising Young Woman.” That wretched film essentially turned rape revenge into the cinematic equivalence of a moralizing essay you’d read on Jezebel — may that website rest in peace should current efforts at a resurrection fail. Nevertheless, she won the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay and, for better or worse, embodied an image of “girlboss cinema.” 

Ms. Fennell’s sophomore effort, “Saltburn,” promises to be a psychedelic ride into undergraduate life at Britain’s top university, where many of its most elite students congregate to study and party. Considering Ms. Fennell’s privileged upbringing —the Oxonian is the daughter of jewelry magnate Theo Fennell, who is known as the “King of Bling” — she would probably be the best person to confront this issue head-on. While it certainly has moments of visual spectacle, the final product of “Saltburn” is ultimately empty in its substance, with many choices in its direction and screenwriting that veer into the questionable. 

“Saltburn” begins with a series of static shots, restrained under a four to three ratio, in which Oliver Quick — Academy Award nominee Barry Keoghan — lays his eyes on a posh university student named Felix — Jacob Elordi of “Euphoria.” Oliver hails from the middle class and earned a scholarship to Oxford. In an attempt to fit into these elite ranks, he accepts an invitation for the summer to Felix’s estate, known as Saltburn. Throughout its 127 minutes, these sequences repeat themselves incessantly. In between are moments where Oliver reveals a sinister side to get to the film’s predictable twists and turns.

If any of this sounds familiar, it’s because “Saltburn” is more than reminiscent of 1999’s “The Talented Mr Ripley,” in which an underachieving young man travels to Italy to retrieve a spoiled playboy back to his family at New York, but becomes seduced by the lifestyle and obsessed with his quarry. The difference between this film and “Saltburn” begins with its subtlety. “Ripley” does not have his hero fantasize about his new acquaintance before proceeding to drink the semen stains around the bathtub drain. Yet more importantly, unlike in “Ripley,” none of Ms. Fennell’s characters are palatable. 

Much of the cast takes the film incredibly seriously. The standouts are Rosamund Pike and Richard Grant, who play Felix’s affluent parents. They are both aware that the substance is so bare that they just have fun with the screenplay. Some of the performances, like those of Mr. Elordi and Mr. Keoghan, are more than passable, with the latter switching personalities very seamlessly, and the former embracing his good looks and magnetism. Yet both actors indulge in shocking moments with less camp than they should.  

If it doesn’t have much to say, then how much does the spectacle hold up? If “Promising Young Woman” feels like reading the ramblings of a millennial smarm, “Saltburn” might have been inspired by some articles calling for the return of the erotic thriller. That subgenre, which bubbled up during the 1980s and 1990s, was risque and scandalous. “Saltburn,” by contrast, imitates the genre’s most recognizable aspects but ends up looking safe and risk-free, especially when we reach a third act that is incredibly cliched and contrived. Only ChatGPT could even conceive of this. 

Yet the film is also designed for the TikTok set, with each image calculated to be attention-grabbing before it becomes tiresome by beating that very same note. The mid-2000s time posts are about as confusing, and continue Ms. Fennell’s streak of uninspired needle drops and pop culture references. The film is set in 2006, and Felix’s family comes together to watch “Superbad,” which was released in 2007, while the college sings Flo Rida’s “Low” in karaoke, released in that very same year. 

“Saltburn” is relatively better than “Promising Young Woman,” in that its aesthetic is at least in line with this film’s bonkers direction. Yet if “Promising Young Woman” infuriates the viewer with its crude efforts at moral clarity, “Saltburn” has little to say, because it barely confronts its targets. One may argue that this film is about as elitist as you find in an eat-the-rich picture that falls short of the expectations of its progressive critics: it gives a pass to the affluent few and only sees them as a victim of the insecure middle class, whose exponent, Oliver, is a predator.