WHO IS "THE SERVANT " AND WHO IS THE MASTER ?

I don’t like the idea of having favorites among the films I review on a weekly basis. It feels plain wrong. Like a parent that secretly admits to having a favorite child or something. But sometimes, just sometimes a film will stand out so much in my heart and mind that I cannot help eulogizing about it. The Servant is just such a film. I am writing this review a day after I have watched the film and I am, as I write, plotting an advertising campaign to convince all my fellow students to watch it. I know it sound ever so slightly unhinged, but what can I say. I am overwhelmed.
Tony has just moved back to London. He is a young aristocrat with a lot of means and no immediate need to find a job. But of course, lounging around London not doing a lot is serious business, so the very first thing Tony does is hire a manservant. And this manservant happens to be Hugo Barrett (Dirk Bogarde). Barrett comes with excellent references; Tony is not the sort to get lost in second thoughts and double-checking so he is hired on the spot. Soon Barrett is running the house almost single-handedly. He is a little too efficient for the liking of Susan, Tony’s fiancée. But try as she might to assert herself, make her own mark on the house she hopes to make her own home one day and put Barrett “back in his place”, the more obvious it becomes that Barrett is a bit more than a crafty man grabbing an opportunity when he sees it. And when Veera – who Barrett introduces as his sister – joins the household as a maid, her allure and sex-appeal will bring a whole new dimension in the battle for control…
The Servant is categorically one of the best psychological thrillers I have watched in a very, very long time. What I love the most about it is that it is not concerned with “tidy endings”, the way mainstream cinema would be. It pursues its hypothesis right to the end; and is not concerned in the least with making things look pretty. Then again, what is going on between Tony and Hugo is far from pretty. And Losey is not afraid to show it. This is, I think, what I loved the most about the structure of the film. About an hour and fifteen minutes in, the film comes to what you may consider a natural close. Yet you look at the time left and see that there is a good forty minutes yet to come; you are left unsure as to what on earth could possible happen next… Then the curveballs start raining down. I honestly thought that those last forty minutes would turn out to seem a bit false, you know, “stuck on”… God I could not be more wrong…
Of course the main stay of the film is the “power struggle” itself. On one level there is the battle between the two women; Veera and Susan on a sexual plain. However Veera’s status as the “forbidden fruit” gives her the edge, especially when contrasted with Susan’s primness and propriety; comparing Veera’s mini-skirts to Susan’s “proper” outfits with no cleavage and long skirts are enough to show who has the real advantage… On the other hand it must be remembered that Veera and everything she does is generally part of a bigger plan spun by Hugo. Hugo’s power over Tony is largely based on Tony’s helplessness and inability to cope physically or mentally without Hugo. Come the second half of the film, the two men have even past the point where the two are “equals” – or “old pals” as they put it; Tony is very clearly subservient to Hugo, and quite clearly Hugo is the one running the house and calling the shots. In context of course, this can be read differently; we could see it as a critique of the aristocracy and the upper classes; Hugo is to be blamed, of course, but Tony is to be blamed equally for not taking control of his own life and responsibilities, living off ready money and not even trying to use his own wits. Call it a critique; call it simply a brilliant thriller, The Servant is worth watching again and again. And I’m pretty sure that is exactly what I will be doing.