'The Housemaid' Review: Paul Feig Crafts a Wicked, Stylish Hitchcockian Thriller

Directed by: Paul Feig

Written by: Rebecca Sonnenshine

Starring: Sydney Sweeney, Amanda Seyfried, Brandon Sklenar

Release Date: December 19, 2025

A Star Year for Sydney Sweeney

For all of the noise that continues to follow Sydney Sweeney outside the theater, one thing has remained indisputable: none of it has affected her work. In 2025 alone, Sweeney appeared in four feature films, and at least three of those performances rank among the strongest of her career.

I missed her dark comedy Americana, but I did see Eden, Christy, and her most high-profile release of the year, The Housemaid. Taken together, they form a remarkable run — not just productive, but consistently excellent. While some remained fixated on her personal politics or physical appearance, Sweeney quietly delivered one of the most impressive acting years of any performer working today.

In Eden, she was nearly unrecognizable, shedding glamour to play the reserved, aching wife who follows her husband (Daniel Brühl) to the Galápagos in search of a utopian new life. While Ana de Armas injected chaos and sexuality into the story, Sweeney became the emotional center — calm, observant, and quietly devastating — in what stands as Ron Howard’s best film since Frost/Nixon.

Then came Christy, a bruising biopic that found Sweeney portraying pioneering women’s boxer and LGBTQ icon Christy Martin. Eschewing vanity entirely, she replaced it with grit, pain, and raw physical commitment. The film was largely ignored at the box office, but Sweeney’s performance — especially in the harrowing third act depicting Martin’s survival of an attempted murder — was fearless and unforgettable.

The Role That Ties It All Together

Now comes The Housemaid, arguably the most strategically important role of Sweeney’s career since the surprise success of Anyone But You. Here, she plays Millie, a homeless ex-con fresh out of prison, sleeping in her car while navigating probation and desperately searching for work.

Millie believes her luck has finally changed when she’s hired as a live-in housemaid for a wealthy suburban family outside New York City. The Winchesters — Nina and Andrew (Amanda Seyfried and Brandon Sklenar) — appear flawless. They live in a sprawling mansion, dote on their young daughter, and project a magazine-cover version of domestic bliss. Nina explains the urgency of the hire by revealing she’s pregnant, a detail that reassures Millie she’s genuinely needed.

For Millie, the job means stability, safety, and dignity — something she hasn’t had since before prison. Of course, perfection is a lie, and The Housemaid wastes little time letting the cracks show.

A Dangerous Game of Appearances

The tension begins almost immediately, particularly when Millie meets Andrew for the first time. The attraction is palpable, mutual, and deeply inappropriate — a spark that quietly destabilizes the household. What follows is a slow-burning psychological chess match, one that grows more unsettling with every passing scene.

I won’t spoil the film’s twist, and I strongly encourage others to experience it unspoiled. Genuine surprise has become increasingly rare, especially for those of us who watch movies for a living. Yet Paul Feig continues to pull it off.

Paul Feig’s Hitchcock Obsession Pays Off

Once known almost exclusively for blockbuster comedies like Bridesmaids, The Heat, and Spy, Feig reinvented himself with A Simple Favor — a glossy, internet-age Hitchcock homage that revealed his deeper fascination with suspense, style, and moral rot beneath polished surfaces.

That evolution continues here. The Housemaid feels like the natural next step in Feig’s Hitchcock phase, leaning even harder into erotic tension, psychological manipulation, and the danger lurking beneath wealth and respectability.

Sydney Sweeney and Amanda Seyfried embody two opposing Hitchcock-blonde archetypes. Sweeney’s Millie is street-smart, guarded, and dangerous in ways that aren’t immediately visible. Seyfried’s Nina is icy perfection — a meticulously curated super-mom whose psychological games are delivered with terrifying precision.

Seyfried is particularly chilling here. Her performance only works because of the absolute conviction she brings to Nina’s cruelty, making each act of gaslighting feel plausible, deliberate, and deeply sadistic.

Two Women, One Reckoning

Millie is no innocent. She carries the weight of a manslaughter conviction and the illusion that she’s successfully buried her past. While she sees through Nina’s surface-level manipulations, she underestimates just how calculated and far-reaching those tactics truly are.

What Millie lacks in social power, she makes up for in instinct, resilience, and will — traits that become essential when the film finally forces its two Hitchcockian forces into direct confrontation.

Seyfried evokes Grace Kelly’s brittle elegance under pressure. Sweeney, meanwhile, recalls Janet Leigh — if Leigh had survived Psycho and turned the tables with brutal efficiency. Watching these two energies collide is the film’s greatest pleasure.

A Stylish, Adult Thriller That Delivers

With The Housemaid, Paul Feig delivers a sleek, sexy, and genuinely unsettling adult thriller — the kind Hollywood rarely makes anymore. It’s witty, carefully constructed, and loaded with menace beneath its polished exterior.

Hitchcock could only ever imply certain things. Feig goes further, crafting a film that understands desire, power, and danger as intertwined forces. The result is a confident, seductive thriller anchored by two exceptional performances and a director fully in command of his evolving voice.

The Housemaid isn’t just entertaining — it’s proof that style, intelligence, and surprise can still coexist in mainstream cinema.

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Sydney Sweeney, Amanda Seyfried, Paul Feig, The Housemaid Review, Psychological Thriller, Hitchcock Style, Modern Thrillers, Movie Reviews, Film Criticism, New Releases