The Housemaid

Tropic Sprockets by Ian Brockway

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From Paul Feig (“Bridesmaids”) is an adaptation of Frieda McFadden’s novel “The Housemaid.” The suspenseful black humored story teases and mimics TV movie conventions as a conceptual exercise, while the main roles still retain their heart and feeling.

By using the formula trappings of “Fatal Attraction,” Hallmark movies or the cliche of the sweet seeming neighbor next door, this film grimly tickles you with tension, even though there are plenty of turnabouts. While the switches and detours seem academic studies in patience, one remains engaged.

Millie (Sydney Sweeney) is a young woman looking for a job because of her troubled past. She settles on an interview with Nina (Amanda Seyfried), a rich wife in a secluded house. Nina is quite taken with Millie and gives her the job of housemaid.

At first everything is picture perfect. Then it becomes shockingly clear, that Nina has disturbing emotional episodes, violent and jarring.

Millie is at a loss for words. Neighborhood opinion and gossip rise sympathetically for the extremely handsome husband Andrew (Brandon Sklenar) who is revered as a dreamy saint for maintaining under duress.

Nina is ultra controlling harsh and aggressive. One afternoon, she comes to the door with blood on her apron, visibly upset. The next week Nina threatens Millie with termination, sending her on a futile ticket reservation errand.

In an attempt to smooth things over, Andrew proposes a secret escape with Millie involving a popular play. Millie reluctantly consents.

Nina finds out about the tryst and Andrew sides with Millie, confessing love but all is not as it appears. One can foresee the surprise but that is part of the enjoyment.

The grue and garish gore swings back and forth and back again but both Seyfried and Sweeney have an understandable score to settle. Both actors never lose their character, their genuine sensitive ferocity, or their fire.

The first half of the film can be seen as a nostalgic send up of 1990s romantic thrillers, while the last is a grand guignol Edgar Allan Poe ambrosia of pain and revenge. The many twists have a good chance of giving one whiplash, but the melodrama never loses its mayhem in large credit to Seyfried and Sweeney but also to the young actor Indiana Elle who plays Nina’s sarcastic daughter Cecille. This Nora Ephronish Nightmare is satisfying and scary, its pointed heart saves it from silliness.

Write Ian at ianfree11@yahoo.com