THE HOUSEMAID (2010)
Written and Directed by:Im Sang-soo
Starring: Do-yeon Jeon, Jung-Jae Lee, Yeo-Jong Yun, Seo Woo
In this remake of a 1960 Korean film of the same name, Director IM Sang-soo pulls a level of near-Hitchcockian suspense out of a tale of power and sexuality that outdoes many of the so-called thrillers to come out of Hollywood in recent years.
The story is relatively simple: A young girl named Eun-yi (Do-yeon Jeon) is living a meager existence in Korea until she is hired on as the maid to an inordinately wealthy couple, Hoon (Jung-jea Lee) and Hae-ra (Seo Woo). Working under the tutelage of Byung-sik (Yeo-Jong Yun), the old maid who has become bitter, Eun-yi is seduced not only by the family’s lifestyle and children, but by the husband, Hoon, who uses his position in the house to begin an affair with Eun-yi, at least somewhat against her will.
What makes THE HOUSEMAID rise above its simple story is the quality of the performances across the board, but especially from Do-youn Jeon and Seo Woo, who are perfectly cast as polar opposites of each other, highlighted by Sang-so’s decision to keep Eun-yi in white and Hae-ra black throughout the film. Eun-yi starts innocently enough and as she continues to get mistreated by Hoon and the family at large, she starts to smolder under the surface, though she’s still ultimately a victim of her station. Hae-ra starts as an ice princess, who is taking such advantage of her pregancy to the point that she has Eun-yi essentially do her yoga poses and paint her toes while she inches ever closer to bursting but her heart begins to melt and she takes action, if only to help to secure her place in the house. I also throughly enjoyed the performance of Hae-ra’s mother, who is willing to do absolutely anything to make sure her daughter continues to live comfortably. It’s almost like a sadistic take on Angela Lansbury’s mother in the original MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE.
The house itself is also a remarkable character, much like the house in AMITYVILLE HORROR, though in this case the house is used to illustrate the cold clinical people who live within it and highlight the horror of the things they do to each other by being very elegant and crisp, to the point at which it almost becomes unsettling. It’s the kind of house that Patrick Bateman could love.
While the pacing of the film is done fairly well, there were moments that were meant to continue escalating the tension that never really connected for me, but things moved briskly enough that it never became much of a bother and there was such a sinister feeling which did increase throughout that compensated it for me.
THE HOUSEMAID is a dark erotic thriller with phenomenal performances, stellar production design and an explosive finale that you won’t soon forget. Check this one out. If you don’t believe me, read
4 out of 5
