SPOILER WARNING: This article contains major spoilers for plot points in “Housemaid“, now in cinemas.
For fans of Frieda McFadden's thriller The Maid, watching the Lionsgate adaptation was a completely different experience—we knew there was a twist. While most of the book's highlights were featured in the film, not everything was the same. In fact, there was one storyline many less in the movie than in the book.
“The Maid” is about a young woman, Millie (Sydney Sweeney), who has a dark past and is desperate for a job; she happily agrees to work as a maid for the wealthy family of Nina and Andrew Winchester (Amanda Seyfried and Brandon Sklenar). She soon learns that their seemingly perfect life is far from it.
The book is divided into two points of view: first Millie's, then Nina's. From Millie's point of view, Nina is a villain, mentally unstable, a harsh wife and mother, while Andrew does everything to make her happy. Millie hears from the community that Nina tried to commit suicide after leaving her daughter to die in the bathtub. Fortunately, her loving husband Andrei called the police in time, and Nina was hospitalized. He is the man who decided to stay with her and take care of her.
Brandon Sklenar as Andrew Winchester and Amanda Seyfried as Nina Winchester
Daniel McFadden/Lionsgate
In the second half of the book and film, Nina's point of view reveals what really happened: shortly after marrying Andrew, he began abusing her and locking her in the attic without food while torturing her. One day he drugged her and she woke up in the bathroom to find her daughter in the bathtub and the police taking her away. From then on, he continued to punish her and threatened to take her away again if she didn't stay. She decided to hire Millie to escape – she knew he would cheat – but also because of Millie's past. Millie spent 10 years in prison for murdering a man who attacked a friend to kill him.
Below, Diversity reveals some of the biggest changes in the book and film, including the ending.
Torture of Andrew Milley
In both the film and the book, Millie begins to piece together what happened after Andrew locked her in the attic and began torturing her. But in the book, he forces Millie to painfully balance three large books on her stomach for hours. He installed a surveillance camera, and when she does it wrong the first time, he forces her to do it again.
In the film the scene is more violent. Since she was locked in the attic for accidentally breaking antique dishes, he orders her to use a piece of plate to make 21 deep cuts on her stomach.
Torture Millie Andrew
In the book, Millie then taunts Andrew and gives him a taste of his own medicine, asking him to balance the same three books on his groin, and then orders him to pull out his teeth with pliers.
In the film, after Millie is released, she uses the knife Nina hid inside to slit Andrew's throat and lock him in the room. As he bleeds to death, she breaks his mother's china in front of the door and orders him to pull out his front tooth since he has convinced too many people that he is a good man with that perfect smile.
Andrew's death
In the book, the gardener Enzo (who knew what happened to Nina and stayed on the property to try to help) convinced Nina to return to the house to save Millie. When she does, she finds Andrew in the attic, dead from starvation.
The film gets a little darker; Nina's daughter convinces her to return and help Millie, but when she returns to the attic, she opens the door, assuming Millie is locked inside. Instead, Andrew is alive and charges forward, attempting to attack Nina and Millie; he eventually begs Nina to give him another chance, giving her the opportunity to tell him how terrible he is. He ends up being pushed down a spiral staircase by Millie, where he falls to his death.
End
The policeman questions Nina in the book and reveals that his daughter was once involved with Andrew. In the film, a policewoman interrogates him before revealing that her sister was in a relationship with him. Since they both knew the damage he caused, they believe his death was an accident.
At the end of the book, Millie teams up with Enzo to form a group to help abused women. It's not in the movie, but fast forward to a year later, same thing: She's interviewing for a new position in the home of an abused woman who got her name from Nina. Was she hired to kill him? Maybe.
Michelle Morrone as Enzo
Daniel McFadden/Lionsgate
Enzo's participation
Overall, it's important to note that in the book, the family's caretaker Enzo plays a much larger role in the story, having tried to help Nina escape several times and ultimately helping her come up with a plan to hire a new woman to divert Andrew's attention. One day Millie attacks him, knowing it would be smarter than going after Andrew, a married man. He refuses her.
After she escapes, Nina and Enzo spend the night together. Ultimately, he tells her that it is wrong to leave Millie in danger with Andrew. He later calls her to warn her that the light is on in the attic and Millie has not been seen for several days, and invites Nina to come and check on her. She agrees to do this on the condition that he protects her daughter; he does just that.
In the film, the character played by Michelle Morrone was hardly part of the story. It's eventually clear that he did help Nina try to escape, but he's more of a supporting character than a key part of the film.
If more films come out and they stick close to the story told in the books, Enzo will return – and not in a small way.
