6.5 | / 10 |
Users | 0.0 | |
Reviewer | 3.0 | |
Overall | 3.0 |
Drama | 100% |
Romance | 45% |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 1.37:1
Original aspect ratio: 1.37:1
English: DTS-HD Master Audio Mono
None
25GB Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Region A (B, C untested)
Movie | 2.5 | |
Video | 2.5 | |
Audio | 3.0 | |
Extras | 0.0 | |
Overall | 3.0 |
There’s more than a little (perhaps) unintended irony when Paulette Goddard, playing ambitious servant Celestine in
the 1946 Jean Renoir film The Diary of a Chambermaid, confides in scullery maid Louise (Irene Ryan) that she’s
sick
of working for others and will seduce the next man she meets, but only if he has money. Love? That’s for fools, at
least in Celestine’s world view. But money—that’s the key to happiness. It’s ironic for Goddard managed to
land at least three husbands (or quasi-husbands, as the case may be) whose personal wealth and connections
definitely benefited the actress in both personal and professional terms. Goddard’s early life is swathed in mystery, a
mystery only encouraged by the actress herself who repeatedly fudged her birth year (it varies by over a decade in
different accounts), birth place and even her parentage (Goddard was sued—unsuccessfully—by her estranged
biological father when she claimed he was not her biological father). Depending on which birth year is
subscribed to, Goddard might have been as young as eleven when she married for the first time (this only
argues for a different birth year, of course, as it’s more likely that she was at least sixteen, which is of course still
incredibly young). That marriage quickly ended in divorce but left Goddard the then staggering settlement of
several hundred thousand dollars, an amount which really could have set her up for life out of the public eye. But
Goddard was nothing if not ambitious (rather like Celestine). Through a rather circuitous series of events, she
ultimately ended up dating (and according to some events, secretly marrying) Charlie Chaplin, who gave the long
struggling actress her breakthrough role in
Modern Times. Goddard had at least mustered her way on to the B-list, if not the actual A-list, and not
content to sit idly by while Chaplin planned his next film, set out on a number of other projects, most notably her nearly
successful lobbying effort to play Scarlett O’Hara in Gone with the Wind. After making The Great Dictator with Chaplin in 1940, the couple split two years thereafter, which also
seemed to precipitate Goddard’s slow but steady decline as a major film actress. After her film career had largely
dissipated, Goddard ended up marrying celebrated author Erich Maria Remarque (All Quiet on the Western Front), who
upon his death left Goddard yet another fortune (including a huge art collection) which allowed Goddard to
spend her remaining years as a regular on the New York City social scene.
But sandwiched in between her relationships with Chaplin and Remarque came a perhaps more unexpected marriage—
to Burgess Meredith, beloved by many for his supporting turn in Rocky, but also the erstwhile Penguin from the 1960’s campfest television version of
Batman. Long before
Meredith indelibly imprinted his nasal rasp and bizarre laugh on an entire generation of kids (and, frankly, adults) in
Batman, he had racked up considerable (and highly lauded) credits on Broadway and in films, and he was in fact
thought of as something of triple threat, working regularly not just as an actor, but also as a director and writer.
Meredith had actually worked with Goddard before their marriage in the 1940 film Second Chorus, but he went
on to produce (and in the case of The Diary of a Chambermaid, co-write) two more films which offered nice parts
for Goddard (the other is 1948’s On Our Merry Way, a portmanteau of comedy bits).
The Diary of a Chambermaid is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Olive Films with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.37:1. Unfortunately the elements used for this high definition transfer have some recurrent and troubling problems. The bulk of the film is littered with noticeable print through and emulsion degradation. It's especially bad in the first twenty or so minutes, and then relents, at least intermittently, though it's certainly still visible if you're looking for it. It returns with a vengeance for the final scene with Goddard and Hatfield in the train car. There's also more routine damage in the shape of flecks and specks. Contrast also varies at least somewhat, though the bulk of the film is fairly consistent if not extremely strong. The overall image is acceptably sharp (though Renoir frequently films Goddard in soft focus) but certainly nowhere near the levels we've seen in other (probably better curated) black and white films of this era, both from Olive itself as well as other labels. This isn't unwatchable by any means, but videophiles are certainly going to notice the flaws that were no doubt endemic in the source elements and which were not corrected or ameliorated with any sort of restoration.
The Diary of a Chambermaid features a lossless DTS-HD Master Audio Mono track which is nominally better than the image quality, but which like the image quality shows signs of age and wear and tear. There's noticeable hiss throughout the track, strangely much more audible toward the middle section of the film (by contrast, the worst print through in the image quality is at the beginning and end). Fidelity is decent, with dialogue and score (which features heavy use of the song "Fascination") fairly cleanly presented. The track definitely is a product of its era, and so the typical boxy midrange is more than apparent.
No supplements are offered on this Blu-ray disc.
It's fascinating (no pun intended, considering the film's use of "Fascination") to me that two iconic filmmakers, Jean Renoir and Luis Buñuel, were both drawn to this property and yet both failed to really successfully handle it as well as might have been hoped. In Renoir's case, he was hobbled by an ineffective screenplay and a producer-writer who also wanted to co- star and feature his then-wife in the lead. Buñuel may simply have been a victim of his own well known excesses. The Diary of a Chambermaid in Renoir's formulation hovers uneasily in a netherworld that is part social commentary, part melodrama, and part Freudian overkill. The result isn't cohesive in any meaningful way, but it's strangely compelling nonetheless. Renoir fans will probably want to check this out one way or the other, despite its flaws, but it's obvious the source elements utilized for this Blu-ray were in questionable shape. Unfortunately the film is of such little general interest the hope for what would be an extremely expensive and time consuming full scale restoration is probably nil.
2011
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Signature Edition
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+ 1931 The Front Page
1940
2011
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Limited Edition to 3000
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Warner Archive Collection
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