she will not harm anyone else in his family. He crawls downstairs and dies next to his wife, asking her to "Take good care of the children." The film ends with the composer reading the story from a newspaper with his wife, returning to the very beginning of the film. The film's narrative has apparently been told by the composer, who then smiles and warns the film audience that this is just the sort of thing that could happen to anyone. Cast Kim Jin-kyu as Dong-sik Kim (the husband/father) Ju Jeung-ryu as Mrs. Kim (the wife/mother) Lee Eun-shim (이은심, 李恩心) as Myung-sook (the housemaid) Um Aing-ran as Kyung-hee Cho (the factory worker who takes piano lessons) Ko Seon-ae as Seon-young Kwak (the factory worker who commits suicide) Ahn Sung-ki as Chang-soon Kim (the son) Lee Yoo-ri as Ae-soon Kim (the daughter) Kang Seok-je Na Jeong-ok Reception and legacy In 2003, Jean-Michel Frodon, editor-in-chief of Cahiers du cinéma, wrote that the discovery of The Housemaid by the West, over 40 years after the film's debut, was a "marvelous feeling—marvelous not just because one finds in writer-director Kim Ki-young a truly extraordinary image maker, but in his film such an utterly unpredictable work". Comparing the director to Luis Buñuel, Frodon wrote Kim is "capable of probing deep into the human mind, its desires and impulses, while paying sarcastic attention to the details". He called The Housemaid "shocking", noting that "the shocking nature of the film is both disturbing and pleasurable". Frodon pointed out that The Housemaid was only one early major film in the director's career, and that Kim Ki-young would continue "running wild through obsessions and rebellion" with his films for decades to come. Bong Joon-ho has said The Housemaid was one of the inspirations for his 2019 Academy Award-winning film Parasite. References Bibliography Further reading External links Review at asiandb.com Review at filmbrain.com Review at Koreanfilm.org The Housemaid: Crossing Borders an essay by Kyung Hyun Kim at the Criterion Collection 1960 horror films 1960s psychological thriller films South Korean psychological horror films 1960s Korean-language films Films directed by Kim Ki-young Maids in films 1960s psychological horror films South Korean films based on actual events