The Housemaid
Director: Im Sang-Soo
Year Released: 2010
Rating: 2.5
An incredibly rich family hires an emotionally fragile housekeeper (an excellent Jeon Do-yeon), but when the wine-swilling husband seduces her and impregnates her, she becomes ostracized and the family puts their heads together to get back at her. While it isn't bad for a Bruised Woman movie, I don't think it's that much of a 'scalding' attack on the upper-class mores of buying-your-way-out-of-problems - the family tries paying off Jeon's character, but she takes a different approach: of self-immolation. The film intends for you to think the family's one child - who took a liking to the housemaid - will somehow be forever altered by the fiasco, but truth is wealth is still power, and memories fade, and the powerful generally remain powerful. A smarter film might have had the maid destroy the family's reputation; this seems like it sinks in moral defeat.
