Diary of a Chambermaid (Le journal d'une femme de chambre)

France, 1964. Director Luis Buñuel. 97min.

Buñuel’s story finds its origin in the novel of Octave Mirbeau. The plot follows the young Celestine who goes to work as a chambermaid in rural France of the late 1920s. Her employers are a dysfunctional bourgeois family of three, all of whom carry out clandestine activities behind closed doors. Rabour, the master of the household, owns an album of dirty postcards and a collection of ladies footwear. He obliges his maids to wear black leather boots while they read to him. He, in turn, strokes their boots and calves lustfully during this session. Part-way into the film he is found dead, lying naked in bed, clutching a pair of boots in his arms.

With Jeanne Moreau.
Costumes by Georges Wakhévitch.

For further reading, see Christel Tsilibaris’ essay Shoes, Eroticism and Fetish.

Past screenings:

Between Stigma and Enigma – London
Wednesday 17 May 2006, 19:30 | Ciné Lumière
Introduced by festival co-curator Christel Tsilibaris.

The 1st Fashion in Film Festival – New York
Sunday 18 March 2007, 16:00 | Museum of the Moving Image

The 1st Fashion in Film Festival – Arnhem
Saturday 16 June 2007, 19:30 | Focus