In Claude Chabrol's LA CEREMONIE, the wealthy Lelievre family live in a grand estate in the calm isolation of the French countryside. All that lacks in their lustrous lifestyle is the perfect maid, who they believe to have found in the shy and recalcitrant Sophie (Sandrine Bonnaire). The match seems to be perfect and Sophie proves to be 'a bit bizarre, but a real pearl' according to Madame Lelievre (Jacqueline Bisset). Sophie remains distanced from the family and only comes out of her shell when she meets Jeanne (Isabelle Huppert), the spirited and gruff local postal clerk with a grudge against the Lelievres. The two spark a friendship based on their mutual distrust of the slightly aloof Lelievres and they soon learn that they have similar secret pasts. But as Sophie and the postal clerk work themselves into a veritable frenzy of hatred and disdain, Sophie hides an even more troubling secret that fills every moment of her life with shame and terror, and only serves to increase her antagonism towards the Lelievres. Claude Chabrol masterfully guides what starts as a seemingly slight drama into his patent Hitchcockian terrain of explosive psychological melodrama, all couched within a brutal yet detached critique of the bourgeoisie. Bonnaire is icily terrifying as the intense and mysterious Sophie, and both Huppert and Bisset give powerhouse performances in this vision of the evil that lurks just below the surface of civilised society.

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