Le cameriere

Le Cameriere has an interesting working class outlook in centering on the camaraderie among a group of chambermaids working for different middle class households in a Rome apartment building. The comedy pivots on the disappearance of jewelry owned by a !ady resident whose servant has taken it out to a night club.After the young woman is accused and jailed, the other maids confer and solicit help from another resident, a lawyer. A clue to finding the real thief is a late 50s style pop song (You Make My Head Spin) which gets quite a bit of play, it is a catchy number and reminds me of other music such as American Doo Wop from my youth. There is also some social observation on the various apartment dwellers such as a pretentious fortune teller, a baritone singer, and a family with a governess who speaks French to the children . The story threatens to turn toward the end into one of those bedroom situations where people keep going in and out of rooms but all turns out pleasantly. The direction is by a veteran craftsman, Carlo Ludovico Bragaglia, who is not exactly a personal stylist but who helmed several gems such as the Toto vehicle 47 Morto Che Parla and the peplum Queen of Babylon, I have been checking out some of his career recently. The film didn't get a US release but turned up as part of a package of vintage Italian films shown on several local Tv stations in places like New Jersey and San Francisco, circa 1990.