Harold Pinter’s script is unusually observant in its minute delineation of the relationship between its protagonists, and how that dynamic slowly shifts over the course of the film. THE SERVANT can be called the best film Roman Polanski never made, as it contains so much of what makes Polanski’s work distinctive: an unerring grasp of aberrant psychology, tightly composed visuals, an obsession with voyeurism and an air of suffocating claustrophobia. It’s not long before the roles are reversed entirely, and Tony is serving Barrett! Only now the relationship has shifted, with Barrett using Tony’s neediness to assert his own hitherto submerged tyrannical nature.

The latter apologizes to Tony and is allowed to resume his servant duties. Then one day Tony catches Barrett and Vera having sex and throws them both out.īut Tony can’t live without Barrett for long. Tony quickly becomes smitten with Vera, and Barrett subtly encourages their clandestine relationship. Trouble enters the scene in the form of the seductive Vera, who Tony introduces as his sister. Being the lazy man he is, Tony takes to Barrett’s pampering all too readily, and ends up totally devoted to his servant. The latter, a (seemingly) meek yet dedicated fellow, is staunchly dedicated to Tony’s well-being, frequently going out of his way to make his master comfortable.

Yet the film was a success, and is widely regarded by myself and many others as the absolute best work of Losey, Pinter and Bogarde.įox plays Tony, a British architect who upon moving into an upscale townhouse takes on a live-in servant, the Bogart essayed Barrett. James Fox, in his film debut, reportedly clashed with co-star Sarah Miles, and Losey became deathly ill midway through, forcing Bogarde to temporarily take on directorial duties himself (relaying Losey’s hospital bed instructions). It marked the first of his collaborations with the famed playwright Harold Pinter (the others are ACCIDENT and THE GO-BETWEEN), while lead actor Dirk Bogarde was already a Losey veteran, having appeared in the latter’s 1954 film THE SLEEPING TIGER. THE SERVANT (1963), based on a slim 1949 novel by the nephew of novelist Somerset Maugham, was one of a handful of films made by the American expatriate director Joseph Losey in England, where he relocated after being blacklisted in his native country.

THE SERVANT boasts great direction, writing and acting, succeeding as both a brainy thriller and an intriguing psychological case study. A justified classic, and the very definition of a psychological thriller.

The servant by robin maugham