Frida McFadden’s series of novels is finally breaking onto the big screen courtesy of Paul Feig, who helped to get a similar twisty mystery onto the screen with A Simple Favor. That became a sleeper hit in 2018, and The Housemaid became solid counterprogramming in December 2025. Both Sydney Sweeney and Amanda Seyfried had Oscar hopefuls on the table, which ultimately neither happened, and the combined worldwide grosses of both those films is less than the domestic opening weekend box office for The Housemaid. Sweeny’s Christie made 2.1 million off a 15 million budget, while The Testament Of Ann Lee made 4 million worldwide off a 10 million budget. That’s a little over 6 million between two films, in their total worldwide to date numbers. Their fluffy nonsense that had zero chance of an Oscar nomination made 19 million just on its opening weekend domestically, with a domestic of 126 million, and a worldwide gross of 399 million, all off a 35 million dollar budget. Chasing Oscars didn’t prove nearly as fruitful for these ladies as twists and turns proved to be.

Millie (Sweeney) is a young woman recently released on parole who is offered the titular job by a stay-at-home mom (Seyfried), whose husband (Brandon Sklener) is generationally wealthy, and he now runs a company having to do with data processing. The wealthy couple have a daughter, who Millie is supposed to also look after, and it is in all of this that Millie’s world starts to crumble. She gets everything that sounds great, living in a room in the house (which has a concerning lock situation), being given a new phone, and access to a credit card so she can buy anything the family needs. Everything seems great. Seems.

Things go batshit pretty quickly. Immediately, Seyfried starts presenting as manic, bipolar, or some combination of every possible mental health diagnosis. At first, it feels out of the blue, since she wanted Millie there, then it becomes purposeful, making us wonder why? And therein lies the great mystery, which itself is wrapped in an enigma, inside a riddle. The twists just keep coming. At a certain point, you’d be forgiven for being exhausted by too many, or believing the film is preposterous as a result of too many. But, it is fun, twisted, weird, and unpredictable. At least, on some level, for those who haven’t read the book, it is impossible to see every twist coming. You might get an inkling, or guess one of them, but this film would make M Night Shyamalan’s head spin.

The performances. Seyfried is terrific here, and has really come a long way as an actress. I feel myself saying that more and more as her work in the last few years stands out as some of her best and most memorable. Sydney Sweeney also is given an excellent opportunity to anchor a film in the same sympathetic way Anna Kendrick did for A Simple Favor. While I’m less familiar with Brandon’s work, he does exactly what the film needs him to do, come across as charming, sympathetic, kind, and when the film needs him to do more, he rises to the occasion.

The audio description here is terrific too, as the little things matter, the twists along the way. Some of it is so out in left field, that it’s hard to imagine what this would be like without audio description. Going into The Housemaid is like going to Vegas, and assuming something wild will happen. Instead of waking up in Vegas, this film is like waking up on Pluto. You expected wild and crazy, and got absurdity in the process.

This is one of those films I feel bad for leaving a short review of, except damn near everything is a spoiler. Paul feig has so many surprises here that are not to be ruined. For someone who constantly gets trashed for his Ghostbusters reboot (which I liked) he certainly has found a niche with stories like this and A Simple Favor.

The Housemaid is energetic, defined by devilish lead performances, and a block of twists with a can’t stop, won’t stop attitude. If nothing else, it is certainly not boring.

Fresh: 7.6/10