I’ll be honest; even I walked out of “Salt” muttering to myself that she must have really loved her husband to have gone through the kinds of hell it took avenging his death. The last thought on my mind was that she was an outright sociopath but rather an emotionally tormented woman with nothing to lose and everything to avenge. However, a dialogue spanning two plus hours and plenty of circulating ideas showed me that there is far more to Evelyn Salt than her on-screen slaughter.
The question “Who is Evelyn Salt?” is nowhere near as important as the question, “Who does she belong to?” Yes, this is a spoiler alert but Salt is presented as a benign CIA agent just two years out of North Korea where she was held as a prisoner until her love interest (whom she was using as a cover) raised hell to get her released. Moving on in the story, you learn that Salt was a Russian child, stolen from her parents and trained as a sleeper agent who replaced the real Evelyn Salt as a child. From the time of her birth, Salt was used, traumatized, and controlled by other people—an instrument of two opposing governments and never herself. The one act of genuine love in her entire life came from a German arachnologist, her faux lover, ignorant to her true occupations, who had rescued her from constant torture in North Korea. The tears gliding gently down her face at the start of the movie, walking along the road in prisoner exchange, is perhaps the one and only truthful reaction from that character. Without seeing the movie, you can’t quite understand our characterization of Salt, however, for those of you who have, check the signs: Failure to conform to social norms, consistent lying, reckless regard for personal safety and safety of others, lack of remorse, excessive aggression… sound familiar?
These are all diagnostic criteria for Antisocial Personality Disorder aka sociopathy. This is Salt in a nutshell. Though she genuinely loved her husband (and yes, sociopaths do love but in a covetous and self-serving sort of way), she had no true altruism for him. When given the chance to out herself as a Russian agent and not just a CIA operative who’d been using him for a cover, she remains silent. She willingly and knowingly places his life in danger despite her love for him. This love is self-serving and feeds into Salt’s self-proclaimed want to appear “normal” (look for this line as she says it outright as a reason for her marriage). Was this to compensate for the years of damage she suffers being tossed around from home to home? Reared away from her true parents and then separated from her Russian “family” of child soldiers, Salt experiences consistent and profound separations/false relationships. The only true display of love in her life was that shown by her husband—a man she would rather enjoy two years of lie-covered marriage with than keep distant for his own safety. Okay, so he chose to stay with her despite the dangers, but then why did she never tell him she was also a Russian spy? “By the way dear, someday, Russian agents are going to come for me and possibly kill you. Is marrying me worth all that?” There’s no doubt that Salt was in genuine love, but obviously not enough to let him go and keep him safe.
It’s easy to understand then why Salt goes off the deep end and literally blows up her “family” of brother-soldiers when they have her husband executed right in front of her. Salt chokes back remorse without even a hint of failure and then not even five minutes later executes the man who calls her “daughter.” The question then is what motivates her to continue? Why does she go on to try and avert the Russian plan to kill the President and use U.S. nukes to bomb the Middle East? Is it possible for a woman with no qualms about committing murder and no guilt over consistent lying to the person she loves most… to try and selflessly save the world? Of course not.
Salt’s motivating factor is revenge and seemingly not only for her husband but for her life entirely. “They’ve taken everything from me,” she says alluding to the Russian sleeper agents who’ve controlled her throughout her entire life. But it isn’t a look of bereavement on her face…She’s cold and detached. She’s calculated her vengeance and it’s thankfully in the best interests of the U.S. She mourns subtly and briefly but reacts quickly and without question. She betrays everyone she’s ever known at least once in this movie and does so without a second thought though she’s charming, convincing, and even disturbingly earnest. She spares Agent Peabody’s life only to win over his confidence and spares the Russian President only to foil the Russian plan to incite conflict. Either she’s truly a beacon of altruism, or she’s out for blood and her motivation is entirely self-serving. That’s not a hard thing to figure out but the real wonder is… can a monster also be a hero?
What is a hero to begin with? Is the desire to save the world enough to be called hero or is her act of averting nuclear war a bi-product of vengeance and still worthy of the label heroism? You could argue noble intentions and a simple selfish mistake with her husband but strictly speaking, she has no remorse for the massive loss of life she causes. Salt isn’t above using a U.S. agent as a human silencer and has no problem blowing “family members” (and her husband’s corpse) to bits with way too many grenades. And by the end of her story, Salt is given a free pass to kill the remaining Russian agents out there—her first taste of actual freedom. It’s more arguable that, as a product of her own disorder, until Day X, Salt is never allowed control over her own life and by the end of her story, now has the chance to murder mercilessly and suit her own needs. She’s not a villain, but she’s no altruistic hero of the U.S. Who is Evelyn Salt? She’s a tortured woman who lives multiple lies, endangered the one man who ever loved her, and isn’t above betrayal, vengeance, and manipulation for personal gain. And whom does she belong to? By the end of the movie—not a single person in the world.
