The Servant (1964)

 the servant
after seeing this movie when it was a new release, we were not disoppointed viewing it again,after all these years. brilliant film, with the handsome actor.Dirk Bogarde. who could portray , sinister,roles and love,romance roles. he was a remarkable actor. November 22, 2007

 Very British
"The Servant"

Very British

Amos Lassen and Cinema Pride

Looking back to 1963, I found a British classic which tackled homosexuality long before America incorporated gay themes into movies. With a screenplay by master playwright Harold Pinter and directed by the wonderful Joseph Losey, how could a film go wrong? "The Servant" has a great script, admirable acting and excellent direction.
Tony, an aristocrat, moves to London and hires Hugo Barrett to be his servant and he is to be responsible for everything in the home. He seems loyal and competent but Tony's girlfriend, Susan, does not like him and asks Tony to send him away. However Barrett brings his "sister", Vera, to work in the house with him and she and Tony have a brief affair. Upon returning from a brief trip, Tony and Susan discover that Barrett and Vera, in Tony's room and it so happens that they are actually lovers and not family. They are fired and Tony and Susan break up. Tony later meets with Barrett in a pub and hires him once again. Now Barrett is free to impose his own dark intentions on the house. He turns the tables and switches places with his master. What the film does is take a deep look at class relations in Britain via the switch between a dainty bachelor (James Fox) and his contemptuous servant, (Dirk Bogarde). Barrett realizes and uses his expanding powers over Tony who loses his identity slowly and becomes a slave to the man he hired.
"The Servant" is a movie that is close to perfection especially when considering that it was made so long ago. It is a sinister thriller with a great deal going for it. The homoerotic undercurrent works well and although the movie has aged, it has done so gracefully.
There is a great deal of ambiguity in the film and it carries tension along its plot. Dealing with power and manipulation, a series of quirky developments occur. Harold Pinter is a genius with the English language. His screenplay is terse and laced with the feel of menace.
The movie belongs completely to Dirk Bogarde, however. He gives his role a malevolent campiness which conceals bitterness and rage that was common to the lower classes. This is a satire on the British class system and each character has an archetypal function.
The movie is confusing but it is a visceral experience. Joseph Losey gives us a claustrophobic atmosphere with an edge. Erotic during the first half, it becomes frightening in the second half. The plot moves downward throughout and we feel the sexual permissiveness and suggestion from the very beginning and the tension of which drives the drama. It is an original and brilliant film which cannot be fully analyzed.
The cast is uniformly excellent and as Bogarde reveals the true nature of his character, frightening as well.
August 14, 2007

 The Servant
Written by Harold Pinter, Losey's "The Servant" is a psychosexual allegory of power, exploitation, and class resentment that belongs, in its unique way, to the "angry young man" school of British film. Bogarde was hailed (justifiably) for his sinister turn as Hugo, while Fox easily inhabits Tony, the impotent, manipulated aristocrat. One of the best films of the sixties, and among the best British films ever, "The Servant" is vintage Pinter, and a first-rate showcase for the gifted, under-appreciated Bogarde. July 2, 2007

 Who knew codependence could be this hot?
Supremely dark Losey film starring the incomparable Dirk Bogarde, who takes what you think is going to be a routine "blank-FROM-HELL" role and turns it completely on it's head, insinuating everything and doing nothing overt..... making what he actually does so much more deliciously evil. Some of the shots here are instanious classics and still amaze (the shot of James Fox and his fiance busting Bogarde and his sister, revealing only a continually clarifying silhouette of Bogarde standing naked on the stair landing, while Fox stares up, both appalled and enthralled; Fox's shivering silhouette as he hides from Bogarde behind a shower curtain in a deceptively innocent "game"). Pinter's script is admirably daring, though it does turn a bit too fast from melodrama to allegory for my taste --- it's still Pinter, and all the more brilliant for it regarding pace, timing, and -- of course -- dialogue.
January 5, 2005

 stick with it
Losey's "The Servant" is a film you really have to stick with in order to get to the meat and potatoes. It's almost like two movies in one. It opens up innocently enough, with Dirk Bogarde (Hugo) coming to playboy Tony's (James Fox in a performance that oscillates between being mind numbingly annoying to heart rendingly pitiable) house, offering to be his servant. From there it will take the viewer awhile to understand just how sinister and depraved Bogarde's Hugo is--for a good part of the film he just seems to be a confused, buffoonish servant trying to do his job. From there things get really, really sick.

Co-dependency, class struggle, loneliness, alcoholism and finally madness dominate the house as Bogarde accomplishes a slick mastery of Tony's psyche and then his life. He gets the weak minded and wealthy playboy to cheat on his fiancee, and then takes advantage of the ruins his life is left in afterward. By the end of the film you know everything is screwed in a royal (no pun intended) way. Sickness and betrayal crawl from every frame of the last half an hour, and the transformation the film undergoes is unbelievably well done.

You really don't know who to sympathize with, since the only character with a single intent and purpose is Tony's fiancee who quickly flees when the situation essentially becomes an orgy of broken minds and hearts. This as good and creepily understated a film as Alfred Hitchcock ever made. A must see. November 25, 2004

More reviews at Amazon.com ...