There is something skeevy and suspicious about how the writer designed Raoul, the white poor guy, and Burnham, the black poor guy, to create so lurid a contrast between them. Raoul is so cruel that he is unsympathizable while Burnham is so principled in favor of the safety of our rich white protagonists that by the end he seems more devoted to their safety than his own welfare or that of his family. The tell that reveals the loaded hand of the writer is the movie’s failure to explore what a real living Burnham would think, feel, and do. This evasion is reflected in the denial of Burnham’s due place as a protagonist in the story. The movie guiltily represents him as collateral allowing innocent whites their riches and presents it as a moral tragedy, but refuses to look it in the face. It poses questions about class disparity and then sidesteps them, invoking us to focus instead on the mortality we all share, as if this transcendence bridges the gap in material resources that makes life viable. But notice who is rich and innocent, and who martyrs himself tragically but righteously for the morality of it all. By acknowledging racialized socioeconomic oppression but not engaging with it honestly, this movie functions as a pressure relief valve to ease the moral guilt of neoliberal whites who feel sorry but not remorseful.