Murderous Maids (2000) User Reviews

Unflinching Murderous Maids

[rosscinema · 8/10 · 10 April 2005]

This is the true story of the Papin sisters who caused quite a sensation when they murdered two of their employers and while the film clearly doesn't want audiences to feel remorse for their actions it does brilliantly make you understand the circumstances of their lives. Story is set in Le Mans in 1933 where we see Christine Papin (Sylvie Testud) and her sister Lea (Julie-Marie Parmentier) get a job working together as maids in the household of the Lancelin's and what led to the horrific events that will eventually take place.

*****SPOILER ALERT***** Christine as a child wanted to become a nun like her other sister but her mother Clemence (Isabelle Renaud) forced that idea out of her and instead groomed her daughters as chamber maids. Over the course of her life Christine has slowly become more angry and disappointed by those around her and it has led to her dismissal from several jobs. The only thing that she truly cares for is her younger and less sophisticated sister Lea and together they form an incestuous relationship. With the strong sexual relationship that has taken place and the growing erratic behavior of Christine the unfortunate and tragic events occur when their employers arrive home unexpectedly one night and the two are caught together.

This is directed by Jean-Pierre Denis who often thought about quitting as a filmmaker and this led to many years separating his opportunities and choices. For viewers it's a good idea that he didn't give up hope because the film he has made here is so well made and acted that it becomes possible for everyone to understand certain aspects of why a person would commit something so horrific. The film was shot near where the actual events took place and the story paints a picture of two sisters who have nothing positive in their life except themselves which might shed some light on their sexual behavior. One of the more interesting things about this film is that there is no music composed or used at all and the film quietly allows the audience to feel the power of what is happening without the artificial aid of another source such as music. As wonderfully crafted and shot as this is the film wouldn't be the same without the mesmerizing performance of Testud as Christine who gives arguably one of the best and accurate portrayals of why certain people lack mental stability. The film doesn't back away from the sexual frankness of the relationship between the Papin sisters and it adds to the strength of the story which helps the audience understand the intenseness of their feelings towards one another. This is a powerfully told and disturbing film that may make some audience members uncomfortable and that's to the credit of Denis and Testud who give viewers the opportunity to understand the reasoning of most of the actions that take place.

Crimes of passions not psychopathic killing

[cheer88 · 7/10 · 20 November 2015]

I found out this movie from one review of La Cérémonie. I think the difference between these two is this one is crimes of passions and the other is psychopathic killing.

Christine was apparently madly depressed and also having anxiety disorders. She basically shut herself off from the outside world. Her childhood traumas very much caused her adult mental stages. By reading the facts, she suffered paranoid schizophrenia most likely starting at that period of time. I would wonder whether the director followed the psychological researches of this case or not. The incestuous lesbian relationship explained the cause well since the social class uprising warfare had little bearings of it.

It is a well scripted and logically unfolding. All the leading roles were crafted convincingly. This is not a movie for entertaining but you would hardly forget.

Excellent but unpleasant French period flick

[=G= · 7/10 · 3 October 2003]

Even though "Murderous Maids", as a title, sounds like an American sexploitation B-flick, this film tells the true story of a pair of French sisters who serve as house maids, make incestuous love with each other, and kill their employer. Set in 1930's France, this biographical film spends considerable time developing the characters so when we see their shocking behavior it seems almost understandable. With critical plaudits aplenty, numerous awards, and sterling performances by the pair of leads (Testud & Parmentier), there's little doubt this is a quality film. However, given the unpleasantness of the issues, a somewhat tedious build to the climax, lots of maid stuff, and subtitles for non-French speakers, one should give this film due consideration before committing to the hour and a half watch. Will play best with foreign film buffs and others into serious psychodramas. (B)

I Think I Can Do Without Live-in Domestic Help,

[lawprof · 4 May 2002]

after seeing "Murderous Maids," a short and very intense French exploration of the lives of two sisters whose mother seems to think that being in service is the best life can offer them. She has toiled as a maid of sorts for years but seems remarkably (comparatively) well-off for her supposedly hard life.



I don't speak French and I wonder if the English title is a literal translation of the original. If so it undercuts the essence of the story - the desperately overprotective behavior of "Christine" (Sylvie Testud) towards her younger sibling, "Lea" (Julie-Marie Parmentier). The mother-daughter conflict between Christine and "Clemence" (Isabelle Renauld) grows in intensity but with little warning of Christine's descent into hysteria and madness.

"Murderous Maids" is based on a crime committed in 1933. How closely it tracks the case I can't say but two well-publicized facts about the crime are true: the sisters pursued a torrid incestuous relationship and they did murder both their female employer and her daughter. Christine is not "Rose" of "Upstairs, Downstairs."

Christine, Lea and a third sister begin their story in a convent school. The oldest sister is "called" by God to be a nun and we see her only one more time. I don't doubt there are many who believe they have been called by God and respond with enthusiasm but this woman is creepy.

We see the sisters in a succession of employments with the last being the venue of the victims' rather gruesome dispatch. It's not clear what caused the final departure from a semblance of service to a manic outburst of violence but clearly Christine isn't with the program in terms of wholehearted devotion to her employers.

The sexual relationship is graphically shown and I saw some audience members registering discomfort. How this behavior relates to the double murder is left for speculation. The apparent connection is possible but not necessarily probable. Apart from the murders there is a good argument that their relationship had positive benefits for both women - it is certainly portrayed sympathetically.

Most interesting is the film's view of pre-war domestic servitude in France. It would be hard to imagine this story taking place in England. The extreme haughtiness of the several French employers is quite different than the highest degree of English upper class hubris as usually portrayed by Merchant Ivory and Masterpiece Theater. The employers here aren't eccentric, they are cruel.

"Murderous Maids" isn't going to enjoy a major nationwide screening. Even at Manhattan's Lincoln Plaza Cinema, a temple of the art film, it was shown in the smallest theater. Of course it will be available for rent or purchase soon (very soon, I suspect). Not for kids or the faint of heart.

Sister My Sister is the superior film for this true story.

[sydneypatrick · 6/10 · 14 October 2003]

I am admittedly fascinated w/ the story of the Papin sisters and its

effect on literature and film over the last 70 years, so I looked

forward to seeing this film - knowing the content (murder, incest) is

as disturbing as it is.

Although the cast gives fine performances, and Sylvie Testud is

truly dynamic as Christine, I cannot recommend this film over

Nancy Meckler's 1994 "Sister My Sister." Where this one seems

academic in its focus on the details, SMS puts the kettle on the

slow burner and lets it heat up to the boiling point. And you will not

find more intense performances than those of Joely Richardson

as Christine and Jodhi May as Lea.

SMS is riveting and ghastly and heart-breaking all at once, where

MM left me oddly unmoved but for the graphic depiction of the

murders themselves which Meckler, thankfully, used a more

Hitchcockian hand to depict in her earlier version. Meckler also

employed a more discreet touch to the scenes of incestuous

love-making, adding eroticism to the taboo that actually enhanced

the impact of disturbance rather than making it a gross out of

fleshy incestuous sex.

So, skip this one and look back on the video shelf for the superior

Sister My Sister, and you'll be happy you did.

Excellent film about a true crime

[loeb123 · 9/10 · 12 April 2005]

Film is based on the infamous Papin case which rocked France in 1933. In the town of Le Mans, Monsieur Lancelin, a retired solicitor, lived with his wife and daughter. Seven years earlier, the family had hired two sisters as maids, the elder Christine and younger Lea. Madame Lancelin was strict and would wear white gloves to check for dust and there was surprisingly little personal interaction between the family and maids. One afternoon Monsieur Lancelein came home to pick up his wife and daughter for a dinner engagement and found the door bolted. After awhile police got in through a back window. They found the bodies of Madame Lancelin and her daughter; heads bludgeoned beyond recognition and legs carved like pieces of French bread. Weapons were a pewter jug, hammer and knife. Unique to this case, was the fact that their eyes had been gouged out while they were alive. The maids were found upstairs and confessed. The younger had twice blown out the house fuse and feared reprisal from the mistress of the house. The maids attacked them both when they arrived home; the younger following what the older did. The case became a cause celebre in France as an example of the cultural chasm between employer and servant. The case was also made into a play The Maids by Genet and another film - Sister My Sister. Interesting that all psychiatric testimony about the pair (incest and an extremely dysfunctional background and family) was dismissed by the small town jury but later resulted in such evidence being admitted into French trials.

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Words can't really explain the range the depth of this film

[westpenn49 · 9/10 · 19 November 2003]

Let us be very clear from the beginning, the person who came up with Murderous Maids could not have seen or understood the film. The Injured Assassins, or Injured Killers (assassins just sounds better to me) is much more evocative of the feel and content of the story. For this is not the story of a murder, but the story of two sisters who happen into murder.

First, Sylvie Testud is superb, restrained yet full of emotion, humble but full of pride, cold but full of love.

Many people have commented on the class warfare. The Jean Genet play takes that to an extreme. Some have been pulled in by the story of incest and illicit love between sisters. Denis walks deftly across these problems and presents a story that unfolds itself authentically and truly.

The mother in this movie did give me problems, she seems nicer than her effect on the girls, but remember who it is that puts them in the convent, and how she hides the secret of the oldest sister's pain using it only as a weapon to inflict damage upon Christine (Testud).

As the film came to the climax I briefly thought of Chabrol's Le Ceremonie, but that is another story, another film. Though depressing and slow, but not a second too long, this is a seriously important film for those who value the intensity with which cinema can bring the truth to light.

Wow. Just...wow.

[MidnightMarauder · 1/10 · 24 December 2004]

This movie is bizarre. Better put, it's "freakin' weird". I could give you a plot summary, or some hoity toity analysis, but I would consider it a waste of your time. All anybody needs to know about this movie is two young sisters, one incestuous relationship, homicide, post mortem mutilation, and one really disturbing infatuation. At the end of the movie you feel like you need to go take a shower to wash the filth off yourself, but not in a good way like after "Pulp Fiction" or "Fight Club". It's like you're a teenager (or high schooler being that i am myself still a teenager)and have just done something you A: wish you hadn't done, and B: hope to the Good Lord of Heaven and Earth that your parents never find out about. And nobody likes that. My advise is that rather than defiling your mind and by watching piece of wanton cinematic filth, just go waste your time on something a little less horrible and watch "Kazaam"(yes, I would rather watch "Kazaam" than "Murderous Maids", read into it what you want).

Sylvie Testud is simply superb

[singchef · 10/10 · 28 May 2005]

I first saw an English version of this film many years ago with Joely Richardson playing Christine and the ever so cute Jodhi May as Léa. It was on by chance that I happened on the French version Les Blessures Assassines in a Blockbuster store. After watching it, I bought a copy. Though I liked the English version, very much, I was completely swept away by the French movie, and Sylvie Testud.

Testud, who plays Christine Papin in the film, has got to be one of the most stunning women in film today. Not only is she beautiful to look at, her acting is stellar. She takes you inside the mind of Christine Papin, whether it really happened that way or not. Also a great performance from Julie-Marie Parmentier who plays her younger sister Léa Papin.

I was simply riveted. I am now a HUGE fan of Sylvie Testud and having seen Le Château on cable, I have ordered La Captive on DVD.

Crime between classes

[MikeF-6 · 6 March 2003]

This is the story of the Papin sisters - whose tale inspired a play by Jean Genet and several earlier movies. This is probably the most historical of any of the previous attempts at the telling. Christine and Lea are sisters from a working class broken family in France, a family that has always been `in service.' When Christine expresses a desire to go into a convent like her older sister, the mother screams, `You'll slave for others the way I have.' As Christine tries to protect her younger sister from the world, her blank face in the presence of her rich employees does little to hide her growing bitterness and rage. Sylvie Testud as Christine gives one of the best performances to be seen in recent years. This is a drama of individuals, and - a rarity in these times - a clearly political drama about class conflict. See it despite the tabloid title given to its U.S. release.

those films you don't forget

[Dhomochevsky · 8/10 · 24 December 2003]

This is one of the first movies i saw when i moved to Paris 3 years ago, and after hundreds of other ones, i couldn't tell why it still keeps a special place in my heart. Maybe it's Sylvie Testud's acting, absolutely astonishing, or the disturbing end, i don't know. The fact is i didn't forget and that's why i'm writing it here. This is a film to be watched, but maybe not to be loved... I rated it 8/10, cause of the memory, and Sylvie Testud, whom from this time i don't miss any film she plays in.

A Movie That is Powerful and Fierce

[karinalovesselena · 10/10 · 5 January 2022]

I watched this movie a lot of times and all that can I say this is so powerful and fierce even though it is based on a true story. Sylvie Testud's performance in this movie is absolutely amazing! Even her sex scenes with Julie-Marie Parmentier are all emotional, and I can't see any traces of incestuous sex in it, making it as my most favorite love scene ever! The murder scene, on the other hand, looks like scary to me in a slightly manner. I also salute to the director of this film for having an excellent and amazing film.

Heavy-Handed French melodrama

[stinkpussy2000 · 1 July 2002]

Sorry, but historical accuracy, t & a and good sub-titles aren't enough. As a true-crime fan, I was intregued by this film's attempt to re-construct the lives of these two women as a way of trying to understand their crimes, but the heavy-handedness of the director combined with the sweaty, gross-out sexuality between the two sisters kind of spoiled it for me (There's a sex-scene combining incest, hairy armpits and crepes that I found utterly appalling). The "bad" characters were too overly bad, the "crazy" ones were overly crazy; by presenting this polarized view of life, the director robbed the film of exactly the ambiguity that made these crimes so shocking and difficult to understand. I do, however, give high marks to the scenes of the crimes themselves--which were effectivly shocking--and to the character of the maid's mother who was a multi-dimensional, interesting and surprising character.