The Diary of a Chambermaid

Set in present-day Paris, Radu Jude’s The Diary of a Chambermaid is a variation on Octave Mirbeau’s Decadent-era novel. The anarchist writer’s text gained prominence during the infamous Dreyfus affair, a momentous scandal that exposed deeply seeded, systemic prejudices and reshaped European politics. First published in serialized form from 1891 to 1892, the original was reworked before appearing in the Dreyfusard journal La Revue blanche in 1900 and has since been revived in several significant adaptations (including by Jean Renoir and Luis Buñuel). While no foreknowledge of Mirbeau’s turn-of-the–19th century work (or its high-stakes landscape) is required to sink into Jude’s version, the source material provides fascinating historical parallels for this slapstick skewering of modern-day slavery.

In Jude’s version, Gianina (Ana Dumitrașcu, Dracula), a Romanian migrant (whose own life is paralleled with the original novel’s heroine Célestine) is a live-in housekeeper for an upper-class, pseudo-intellectual couple. In the evenings, she prepares for an amateur production of The Diary of a Chambermaid at the behest of her hoity-toity employers. On her own time, she FaceTimes with her crestfallen tween daughter who lives with her grandma while her mother supports the family from abroad. Everything is going according to Gianina’s plan, until one day, it isn’t.

Offering his most provocative work yet, the latest from art-house cinema sweetheart Jude (Do Not Expect Too Much from the End of the World, TIFF ’23) is a surprisingly tender socioeconomic satire in which the protagonist — presenting herself as an apolitical, obedient, and unobtrusive member of the servant class — highlights how the cycle of exploitation remains unbroken over a hundred years later.

DOROTA LECH

Content advisory: mature themes, may frighten young children