Amanda Seyfried just delivered her second killer performance of 2025, and this one’s properly mental. The Housemaid hit theatres on December 19. Critics are calling it “garishly fun,” “delightfully unnerving,” and basically the perfect holiday counterprogramming for anyone sick of prestige films.
The film adapts Freida McFadden’s 2022 bestseller about Millie, a parolee played by Sydney Sweeney, who lands a live-in housemaid gig with the wealthy Nina Winchester and her husband, Andrew. What starts as a dream job quickly turns into a psychological nightmare.
But here’s the thing. Whilst Sweeney’s name tops the poster, it’s Seyfried who’s absolutely stealing every scene. Critics can’t stop raving about her performance as Nina, the unhinged suburban princess who veers between warm and utterly bonkers.
“Seyfried gets to operate in many different registers,” wrote IndieWire’s Kate Erbland. “Swanning about her Long Island mansion in resplendent whites and creams, she zings between warm and whacked-out, gaslighting proving to be her favourite activity.”
RogerEbert.com was even more blunt: “She puts on every half-cocked mean girl smile, every form of teary-eyed sob, and unblinking rage with vicious ease, utterly washing out her too subtle to register costars.”
Yeah, that’s harsh on Sweeney. Several critics felt she was sleepwalking through the film until the climax. But when you’re opposite Seyfried, going full throttle, anyone would struggle to match that energy.
Director Paul Feig, known for Bridesmaids and A Simple Favor, described the film cheekily as “a Nancy Meyers-type lavishly appointed world if it turned terribly wrong.” He’s not wrong. The movie has been likened to Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?, Single White Female and The Hand That Rocks the Cradle. All of those lusciously trashy ’90s thrillers that used to dominate multiplexes.
The film is sitting at 81% on Rotten Tomatoes. Variety called it “garishly fun and effective postfeminist pulp.” The Wrap said it “wipes the floor with our expectations.”
Brandon Sklenar plays Andrew, Nina’s husband, though critics note he’s basically eye candy who exists to look hot and make Nina jealous. Elizabeth Perkins appears as Andrew’s mother, a “WASP monster” who hates Nina.
The screenplay (from Rebecca Sonnenshine) is also said to feature plot twist(s) even thriller fans won’t predict. And it closes out on Taylor Swift’s “I Did Something Bad” during the credits, and that just feels right for a movie this gleefully demented.
McFadden, the novel’s author, is actually a practising brain surgeon writing under a pen name. Which explains a lot about the book’s twisted plotting.
Seyfried told Gold Derby that Feig encouraged creative risk-taking on set: “He brings out the darkest, funniest shit and is just like, ‘Let’s try it.'” That approach clearly worked. Critics who usually dismiss these sorts of thrillers are genuinely enjoying this one.
The film runs 2 hours and 11 minutes and is rated R for violence, language, and sexual content. It’s counterprogramming for families dragging each other to wholesome holiday films.
Sometimes you just want to watch beautiful people behave terribly in expensive houses. And honestly? With Seyfried giving this kind of performance, who can blame anyone for wanting that right now?
