Faces are saved, barely, as the body goes wholly to ruin in “Savage House,” a mordantly amusing tale of pretense, profligacy and the literally maddening pressures of the English class ladder — written and directed with surgical cruelty by, as it happens, an American. Arriving 12 years after his debut, the derivative indie romcom “The Longest Week,” Peter Glanz’s sophomore feature is an altogether sharper and more distinguished affair, even if it makes scant attempt to hide its debt to “The Favourite” and other caustic costumers of its ilk. Performed with gusto by Richard E. Grant and Claire Foy, as a couple of Georgian grotesques sacrificing everything to host the aspirational dinner party of their dreams, it derives an odd poignancy from the smallness of its stakes, and the severity of its consequences.
That unexpectedly well-matched star pairing will be the chief selling point of “Savage House” when it opens in theaters this Friday, just two days after its world premiere at SXSW London — though it’s an odd package to release in summer with little advance buzz or festival tailwind. The brisk, nasty chill cast by the film may prove divisive; ditto its unapologetically ghastly characters. Glanz takes wicked delight in their suffering, to an extent that recalls nothing so much as Roald Dahl’s “The Twits” (albeit with considerably fancier grooming), and how much you share in that will determine your enjoyment of the proceedings. Either way, the film’s uncompromising commitment to its nauseous comic tone and ambience is impressive, as is its modestly budgeted but claustrophobically detailed evocation of 18th-century faux-noble rot.
