Fresh
Sylvie Testud gives such a ferociously controlled performance that the messy murder seems like a necessary release.
Peter Rainer, New York Magazine/Vulture
Murderous Maids
It wasn't just a crime. It was a crime of passion.
2000 · 1h 34m · N/A
Drama
Directed by
Jean-Pierre Denis
Overview
Based on the true story of two chambermaids (the Papin sisters) of 1930s France who murdered their employer and her daughter. Christine Papin (Sylvie Testud), and Léa Papin (Julie-Marie Parmentier) are sisters with an already troubled past. Madame Lancelin takes them into her home and employs the girls as maids. Christine sees in Madame Lancelin an ideal mother figure — in spite of her severity. But their wretched background — an indifferent mother and drunken abusive father — casts a shadow over the girls and over time their ill-fated situation darkens. The sisters withdraw into themselves and finish by committing the worst — killing Madame Lancelin and her daughter after six years of service, on the 2 February 1933 in Le Mans.
Director and cast
Critics on Rotten Tomatoes
Top critics, in their words
91%
Tomatometer
Rotten
Unfortunately Denis' detached and indifferent camera never gets inside the story, its characters, or its milieu.
Fred Camper, Chicago Reader
Fresh
The film studies a world of deeply entrenched class divisions and sexual taboos, and then, with a scream in the night, draws the study to a close, leaving its meaning, like that of the case that inspired it, open to interpretation.
Keith Phipps, AV Club
Fresh
Julie-Marie Parmentier and Sylvie Testud are eerily convincing as the intense pair of co-dependents in the rigorous but creepy drama Murderous Maids.
Lisa Nesselson, Variety
Fresh
Though far from a feel-good affair, it is never cheap or cynical. Its creepiness is well-earned.
Chris Vognar, Dallas Morning News
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