117 - Diary of a Chambermaid (1964)

Published: Dec. 30, 2019, noon

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Luis Bunuel joins illustrious list of directors to be featured on our podcast. \\xa0What an honor! \\xa0And in classic, Random-Acts-of-Cinema-fashion, we\\u2019re going to start with a later film in a filmmaker\\u2019s oeuvre that doesn\\u2019t quite fit the mold. \\xa0Diary of a Chambermaid tells the 1920s-set story of Celestine, a beautiful and confident femme du chambre who takes employment at a large country estate filled with a mix of controlling, repressed, ignorant, perverse, boorish, and murderous characters. \\xa0She moves among them with aplomb and a sort of detached participation until a vicious crime leads her to more direct and risky involvement with their sordid world. \\xa0Bunuel crafts a steadily-paced and satirizing takedown of French manners and society that leaves it\\u2019s viewers unsettled and uncertain about the trajectory of the European political landscape.

If you\\u2019d like to watch ahead for next week\\u2019s film, we will be reviewing and discussing Torben Skjodt Jensen\\u2019s Carl Th. Dreyer - My Metier (1995).

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