• The Servant

6/28/20 (Sun), Tokyo

Harold Pinter’s 1963 film script portrays a manservant (a superb Dirk Bogarde) who insinuates his way into the home of an apathetic upper-class gentleman (Tony Fox) and proceeds to turn the tables, the new guard displacing the old. It’s a familiar Pinter setup, unrealistic by any standards other than Pinter’s own plays. Pinter was already a highly bankable playwright at the time and did not appreciably change his cryptic theater-of-the-absurd style for the screen. Still, it’s done with great flair. The director of what seems a quintessentially British work is in fact an American, Joseph Losey, who was blacklisted in Hollywood in the McCarthy era and made his name in Europe. This was the first of several acclaimed films he made with Pinter.

Continue reading →