Early 20th century. Insolent of character but doomed to be a chambermaid, Célestine leaves Paris to work in the home of the Lanlaire family. There she finds an authoritarian lady of the house who mistreats her, a husband who continuously paws her, but most of all Joseph, the strange gardener. Because he ignores her, Célestine becomes fascinated by him to the point where she follows him in everything.

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Who better than the iconoclast Benoît Jacquot to again adapt the French novel by Octave Mirbeau, filmed in the last century by both Jean Renoir and Luis Bunuel? On paper, the director of The School of Flesh and Adolphe has the necessary tools to do justice to this virulent class struggle laced with a consuming love story, which perfectly suits the elusive pout of Léa Seydoux, who also starred in Jacquot’s Farewell, My Queen. But the wonderful wickedness of the first part of the story, amplified by slick direction, doesn’t last. Boredom soon sets in, the plot becomes linear and the characters reveal themselves as superficial. By the end it’s a surprise to learn that Diary of a Chambermaid doesn’t have much to say, and that the heart of the movie (the relationship between Célestine and Joseph) is badly handled.