It's the season of capital-I Important Movies at movie theaters. The last quarter of the year is when studios - for the most part - put out their movies with awards aspirations, hoping they can stay in the mind of voters through the lead up to the Academy Awards in March. "Hamnet" is out there making people weep, local arthouses are showing movies like "The Secret Agent," and "Marty Supreme" is dashing into theaters at Christmas. But, in midst of movies looking for golden statues, we sometimes need a reminder that good, escapist trash can be important too. Look no further than "The Housemaid."
Director Paul Feig's new movie is based on the wildly successful book by Freida McFadden, which follows Millie (Sydney Sweeney), a girl with a past who is in desperate need for stable employment. She gets an interview with Nina Winchester (Amanda Seyfried) at her palatial Long Island home to be a live-in housemaid. When Millie and Nina meet, Nina presents a picture of idyllic perfection and tells Millie she thinks that this partnership could work out. Millie leaves the home doubtful she will ever hear from Nina again, but she ends up landing the job, much to her surprise.
Millie gets started immediately and moves into a tiny room in the attic of Nina's home. Nina is typically busy with day-to-day tasks, while her husband Andrew (Brandon Sklenar) works and takes their young daughter to dance classes. Nina and Andrew seem to have it all, but Millie always treads with some skepticism. Her instincts are correct, because not everything behind the gated mansion is as perfect as it seems; Nina becomes combative towards Millie very quickly after she starts to work at their home.
It's important to stress that "The Housemaid" is a very dumb movie. Logic takes the day off at times, contrivances stack up, and the movie is edited together to show character backstories in a sloppy fashion. At times, it feels like the already overlong 130-minute movie is starting over halfway through. But who cares? This is a movie that embraces what it is, and does so with a giddy, twisted smile the entire way through.
Feig, who directed great studio comedies like "Bridesmaids" and "Spy," has shifted towards suburban thrillers like "A Simple Favor" (and its terrible sequel, "Another Simple Favor"), so "The Housemaid" is a good fit for the direction he's taking in his directing career. He knows how to capture the glossy sheen of perfection, while showing the deviousness underneath the perfectly coiffed surface.
"The Housemaid," however, succeeds because of the dynamic between Seyfried and Sweeney. Seyfried's performance is big and operatic, and it works because she is having the time of her life playing Nina. She gets plenty of scenes to go big, and others that allow her to play quieter and menacing. Sweeney is more one-note and stilted, which is a shame because she just showed her range in this year's barely seen "Christy." She's able to play off Seyfried, but the scenes that require Sweeney to do the heavy lifting can occasionally fall flat.
Even when "The Housemaid" spins its wheels and the twists and turns start stacking up on each other, the movie's twisted spirit carries it through. As rewarding as the Important Movies out now are, good trash is important too - and "The Housemaid" is good trash.
| Movie title | The Housemaid |
|---|---|
| Release year | 2025 |
| MPAA Rating | R |
| Our rating | |
| Summary | If you need a breather from the awards-aspiring Important Movies crowding theaters this month, the new thriller from director Paul Feig, which pits Amanda Seyfried and Sydney Sweeney against each other, is a twisted, trashy delight. |
