Movie Description

Diary of a Chambermaid is a 1964 French-Italian drama film. It is one of several French films made by Spanish-born filmmaker Luis Buñuel. Though highly satirical and reflective of his typical anti-bourgeoisie sentiments, it is one of Buñuel's more realistic films, generally avoiding the outlandish surrealist imagery and far-fetched plot twists found in many of his other works. It stars Jeanne Moreau as a chambermaid whose attractiveness is apparent to owners and to servants alike—her femininity charms some, at the same time it brings out jealousy (or admiration) in others of the household and among adjacent neighbors. The maid's predicament, in this light, develops her as a character with some autonomy, and with some powers that derive from the narrative context—which is a social setting of corruption, violence, sexual obsession and perversion. Just off the train from Paris, the chambermaid steps into a waiting buggy from the chateau, its driver already eyeing her, with designs that he expresses by remarking on her shoes.

This was the first screenwriting collaboration between Buñuel and Jean-Claude Carrière, which would later produce his well-known Belle de Jour (1967), The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie (1972) and That Obscure Object of Desire (1977). The two extensively reworked the 1900 novel of the same name by Octave Mirbeau, that had been given a more literal treatment in its second film adaptation, made in Hollywood in 1946, directed by Jean Renoir.