The Maid

Would anyone *want* to become a maid, and more pertinently, would anyone *want* to remain one? Raquel has worked for the same family for 20 years, bringing up the children and cleaning up after everyone. The family in turn seem genuinely fond of Raquel, throwing a surprise birthday party for her in the opening moments and generally tolerating her passive-aggressive behaviour. Yet it's a profoundly dysfunctional situation. Raquel and the daughter are at loggerheads, the mother refuses to discipline her, and she doggedly defends her position from any interlopers, even ones brought in to help when it becomes clear that she's ill. Raquel's favoured tactic is to lock out any maid foolish enough to step outside, though it also extends to throwing the new kitten over the wall, which has the added bonus of upsetting the daughter. It's blackly comic but also unsettling as it highlight's Raquel's mental disarray. Her whole life revolves around this family (her meagre possessions include 3 teddy bears sadly propped up on her bed, and she can barely talk over the phone to her own mother) and she truly has no life of her own. She's also a bracingly unsympathetic presence. We can understand her predicament but emotionally we side with the victimised maids - Raquel adds an unpleasant layer of xenophobia to her campaign against the Peruvian girl. All of which makes the halting steps towards sociability, courtesy of the ebullient Lucy, rewardingly touching.