DIRECTOR: Joseph Losey
Tony (James Fox), an upper-class bachelor who moves into a new London home, hires Hugo Barrett (Dirk Bogarde) to manage his household. Barrett appears efficient and devoted, but Tony’s girlfriend, Susan (Wendy Craig), distrusts him and urges Tony to dismiss him. Barrett brings Vera (Sarah Miles) into the house, claiming she is his sister. Tony begins a clandestine affair with her. Tony and Susan leave for a trip, but when they return unexpectedly, they discover Barrett and Vera together in Tony’s bedroom. Vera is revealed not to be Barrett’s sister but his lover. Tony fires Barrett and ends his relationship with Susan. However, Barrett later manipulates his way back into Tony’s life. Over time, Barrett gradually dominates Tony, reversing their roles: Tony becomes increasingly dependent, passive, and degraded, while Barrett asserts control over the house.
Adapted by Harold Pinter from Robin Maugham’s novella and directed by Joseph Losey, The Servant has a tenuous current of homoeroticism lurking beneath the power play between its master and servant. In fact, much of the tension emanates backward in time from Donald Cammell/Nicolas Roeg’s Performance (1970) a film that was greatly influenced by The Servant and stars James Fox in a similar role.
Pinter’s screenplay is a masterwork of sharp dialogue, silences, and tension and won the NYFCC award for Best Screenplay of 1964. Losey’s masterful direction created a claustrophobic atmosphere, featuring two subtle yet powerful performances and an exploration of power dynamics that mirrored the British class system, a theme he and Pinter would later investigate in Accident(1967) and The Go-Between (1971). The film is considered a landmark of British cinema, and it boasts Bogarde’s most extraordinary performance.
Cinematography: Douglas Sclocombe.
