The Diary of a Chambermaid

In its own strange way, even more genuinely surreal than Buñuel’s later version of Mirabeau’s novel about a keyhole-peeking chambermaid whose arrival in the household of a decadent and eccentric aristocratic family wreaks havoc. What’s so bizarre about Renoir’s adaptation (scripted and produced by Meredith, then husband of Paulette Goddard) is the sheer artificiality of both setting and performances, emphasising the power struggles that develop as a theatre of deceit and delusion. Less bitterly savage than Buñuel, but equally sharp in its satire, it stands on an otherwise uncharted point between LA RÈGLE DU JEU and, say, THE GOLDEN COACH. (Geoff Andrew)