The Housemaid

The Housemaid is a 1960 South Korean film, produced, written and directed by Kim Ki-young. It stars Lee Eun-shim, Ju Jeung-nyeo and Kim Jin-kyu. It has been described in Koreanfilm.org as a "consensus pick as one of the top three Korean films of all time". It is the first film in Kim's Housemaid trilogy followed by Woman of Fire and Woman of Fire '82. The film was remade in 2010 by Im Sang-soo. The film is a domestic horror, following the story of an upper-middle-class family falling into destruction due to the introduction of a sexually predatory femme fatale housemaid into the household. Plot The film begins with a scene of a pianist, Mr. Dong-sik Kim, reading a newspaper story to his wife about a man falling in love with his maid. Mr. Kim works at a factory of primarily female employees, as the piano accompanist for the factory's extracurricular choir group. This was after the Korean War, where economic strife became more prevalent in a time of national division, and so women were sent away to earn more money for their families. Women would often live in these factories, so many extracurricular activities were offered for time outside of work hours. Mr. Kim is incredibly popular among the women at the factory, due to his 'good looks', which entice Kyeung-Hee 'Miss Cho' Cho. Miss Cho pressures her friend to write a letter to Mr. Kim, pouring over how much she is infatuated by him. This ends poorly, as her friend is subsequently fired from the factory. Miss Cho attempts to further pursue Mr. Kim by taking up his offer of piano lessons, which he had proposed to help earn more income during his wife's pregnancy.