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While most of Saltburn is set in the mansion of the same name during the summer of 2007, there are also important scenes set at the University of Oxford and the town of Prescot. The film presents Oxford as an environment marked by stark social stratification. Oliver, who was raised in a middle-class household, struggles to connect to his peers and even with members of faculty. In the office of Professor Ware, he learns that working hard and succeeding academically will not be enough to achieve his goals of upwards social mobility. His only friend in the first few days, a strange mathematics student named Michael Gavey, is similarly ostracized, and the two are excluded from many of the social activities, parties, and balls hosted at Oxford. Even after Oliver befriends the popular and wealthy Felix, Felix’s other friends continue to dismiss him as a “scholarship student” who wears second-hand clothing purchased at charity-shops. At Oxford, Oliver learns a difficult lesson about class difference and the elitism that, in the film, runs rampant at the university.  

One crucial scene is set in Prescot, a suburban town outside of the major city of Liverpool. Lady Elspeth and others at Saltburn assume that Prescot must be an “awful slum” due to its proximity to Liverpool, which has a long history as a center for working class people in Northwest England. When Felix answers Oliver’s phone and speaks to Oliver’s mother, Paula, he devises a “surprise trip” to take Oliver back to Prescot to see her. When Oliver realizes where they are heading, however, he panics and begs Felix to turn back. In Prescot, Felix is surprised to see that Oliver was raised in a nice, middle-class household. Oliver’s parents, pleased to see their son and his friend, bring out champagne and snacks. This setting represents a middle-class lifestyle that is far-removed from Saltburn and underscores Felix’s deceptive nature.  

Saltburn, a large and winding English mansion, is the primary setting of the movie. When Felix first walks Oliver through the house, he suggests that King Henry VIII once stayed at Saltburn and points to its other features and treasures, including a copy of Shakespeare’s Folio, a painting by Flemish Baroque artist Peter Paul Rubens, and a hallway full of oil portraits of family members extending back centuries. Saltburn is a typical English country house, serving as base for a storied and aristocratic family. For Oliver, Saltburn represents the wealth and pedigree that he desperately desires. Venetia, sensing his intentions despite her disturbed state after the death of Felix, compares Oliver to a moth that bangs against the window, hoping to get into the house. Ultimately, he is successful in his goals, extending his stay at Saltburn after the deaths of Felix and Venetia, and, through patient and careful scheming, inheriting the mansion from Lady Elspeth. Saltburn is, in the end, Oliver’s prize for outsmarting the Cattons, though his victory comes at a steep price.  

Most of the plot of the film, including the scenes set at Oxford and during Oliver’s summer at Saltburn, is set between 2006 and 2007. The movie establishes this period in several ways. Students at Oxford don the bold, neon colors and hairstyles that marked the fashion of the mid-aughts, and the soundtrack includes several electronic and pop music hits that were released in that period. The movie both begins and ends, however, in 2022, as an older Oliver appears to address the camera directly. As the ending of the movie reveals, Oliver is back at Saltburn with a dying and unconscious Lady Elspeth, confessing to his crimes and reveling in his ability to outsmart the Cattons.  

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