The Maid Directed by Sebastian Silva | Written by Silva and Pedro Peirano
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The movie’s opening sequence nicely frames the awkward relationship between Raquel (played with stone-faced impassivity by Catalina Saavedra) and the family she serves. Sitting in the kitchen alone, eating dinner in her uniform, she overhears the family out in the dining room as they whisper conspiratorially, preparing to present her with a birthday cake and gift. The mother, Pilar (Claudia Celedon), summons her with the dinner bell, but Raquel doesn’t budge, and no amount of calling will bring her into the dining room. The father, Mundo (Alejandro Goic), and the eldest child, Camila (Andrea Garcia-Huidobro), exchange annoyed glances. Finally the second child, Lucas (Agustin Silva), drags the embarrassed maid into the room to be serenaded with a perfunctory “Happy Birthday.” The little observance is predicated on the idea that she’s an equal—yet no one else in the house is expected to come running at the sound of a bell.
Most of these mixed feelings he’s invested in Camila, a college student who’s grown increasingly resentful of Raquel’s authority. “I don’t know what I’d do without these kids,” Raquel declares at the birthday gathering, prompting a dubious reaction from Camila. Later that evening the two get into a spat when Camila brings a friend home to study, the young women start foraging in the kitchen, and Raquel shoos them out. Their feud continues the next morning when Raquel, ignoring Camila’s request to let her and her friend sleep late, starts vacuuming the hallway outside Camila’s bedroom. “She’s always hated me,” Camila tells Pilar, a genial woman who habitually takes Raquel’s side. Pilar dismisses this idea, but later in the movie she slips into Raquel’s room, sneaks a look at her private photo album, and is stunned to see Camila’s face scraped off two old prints.
