Movie Review

Fresh face Julio Torres breaks through with absurd and topical Problemista

Julio Torres in Problemista

Photo courtesy of A24

The best thing about the art of movies is that there will always be someone willing to push the boundaries. Filmmakers like Charlie Kaufman, Yorgos Lanthimos, Wes Anderson, Kelly Reichardt, and more don’t play by the rules of more mainstream people, which makes their films stand out for movie lovers. Joining that list is actor, writer, and now director Julio Torres, thanks to his breakout film, Problemista.

Torres – who looks like a Latino Justin Long - plays Alejandro, an immigrant from El Salvador who’s hanging on by the skin of his teeth in New York City. He has a dream of landing a job with toymaker Hasbro (although his ideas are, shall we say, off-kilter), but takes other less-desirable jobs to maintain his work visa. As the film begins, he’s working for FreezeCorp, which hosts the bodies of people who’ve decided to freeze themselves in hopes of being re-animated in the future.

It’s there that he encounters the manic Elizabeth (Tilda Swinton), whose artist husband Bobby (RZA) froze himself after a terminal cancer diagnosis. A mishap results in Alejandro getting fired, and since he needs a job to stay in the country, he soon agrees to be an assistant to Elizabeth, who is desperately trying to sell Bobby’s old paintings – all with an egg motif – in order to keep paying for Bobby’s storage.

Torres, who until this point was best known for writing on Saturday Night Live and co-creating the HBO show Los Espookys, has made a delightfully weird film with all sorts of fun details and slyly observant storytelling. With Alejandro almost always one step away from being deported, it is very much a contemporary immigration story. Torres makes sure to keep this part front of mind with repeated trips to an immigration lawyer and calls back home to Alejandro’s mother.

But the tone of the film is one of barely controlled absurdity, demonstrated in scenes showing Alejandro’s multiple roommates, his attempts at earning cash with side gigs, or, especially, his interactions with Elizabeth. Elizabeth is, to put it kindly, all over the place, with her seemingly ADHD mind never able to keep anything organized – her thoughts, her home, or – in a running gag – her database of Bobby’s paintings.

Somehow, Torres keeps the story on the rails by contrasting the opposite personalities of Alejandro and Elizabeth in highly entertaining ways. The pleasure of seeing the timid Alejandro - who sports a constant cowlick in his hair and has a kind of a bouncy way of walking - match up against the off-the wall Elizabeth - who’s never met a person she wouldn’t confront - has a consistency to it, and the film rarely dips in momentum.

Alejandro is the type of mild-mannered character that normally fades into the background, but Torres makes him eminently watchable with the previously-mentioned quirks and more. He holds his own against the tour-de-force performance by Swinton, who is scarily believable as the frenzied Elizabeth. Plenty of people are sure to know someone who exhibits similar traits, and she nails every nuance perfectly.

With a fun-but-odd story that also touches on a hot-button topic in a sincere-but-light way, Problemista may have a chance to gain a similar fandom to those who liked Everything Everywhere All at Once. Torres has established himself as an actor, writer, and director to watch – not bad for his feature film debut.

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Problemista is now showing in select theaters.

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Movie Review

Amanda Seyfried and Sydney Sweeney go off in trashy film The Housemaid

Photo courtesy of Lionsgate

Amanda Seyfried and Sydney Sweeney in The Housemaid.

Both Amanda Seyfried (the upcoming The Testament of Ann Lee) and Sydney Sweeney (Christy) are starring in movies with Oscar ambitions this year. By sheer coincidence, the two actors are also co-starring in The Housemaid, a thriller coming out within weeks of their more ambitious works, one that is likely to be seen by many more people than those prestige plays.

Sweeney is given top billing as Millie, a down-on-her-luck ex-convict looking to land any type of job so as not to break her parole. She finds a too-good-to-be-true lifeboat with Nina (Seyfried), who hires her to be a housemaid for her large house on Long Island, where she lives with her husband, Andrew (Brandon Sklenar), and daughter, Cecilia (Indiana Elle).

After a warm interview, Nina almost immediately becomes highly erratic, whipping back-and-forth between happy-go-lucky and rageful. It seems clear that Nina is suffering from mental health issues, as she’ll often accuse Millie of misplacing or stealing items that she didn’t take. Andrew, apparently used to Nina’s tirades, tries to protect Millie from the worst, something that grows increasingly difficult as Nina ups the ante.

Directed by Paul Feig (A Simple Favor) and adapted by Rebecca Sonnenshine from the bestselling book by Freida McFadden, the film is likely the trashiest mainstream movie to come out in 2025. The first half of the movie relies not on story but on moments as Nina embodies the word “hysterical” to an unbelievable extent. The resigned acceptance of the abuse by Millie, as well as the saintly patience of Andrew, make almost every scene laughable, as nobody seems to be acting anywhere close to how a person would normally react to such extreme situations.

The scenes and the performance of Seyfried are so over-the-top, in fact, that it’s clear that the filmmakers are in on the joke. It’s next to impossible not to have a little bit of fun while watching the actors react to outrageous incidents as if nothing is out of the ordinary. The worse Nina acts, the more Millie and Andrew retreat into their chosen roles, and the funnier the film becomes.

Fans of the book will know that the story changes course, eventually turning into a more stereotypical thriller that also has some relatively gnarly visuals to offer. But the trashiness continues, with Sweeney’s, um, assets repeatedly on display in both clothed and unclothed ways. The sex appeal of the R-rated movie makes it an outlier, as recent studio films have shied away from asking their big stars to disrobe completely.

Both Seyfried and Sweeney are far from their Oscar hopeful roles here. Seyfried is given free rein to act as brazenly as she pleases, and she takes full advantage of that ability. Sweeney seems to have been told to be much more reserved, and unfortunately that results in too many wooden line readings. Sklenar continues his breakout streak (It Ends with Us, Drop) with a role that allows him to show more range than either Seyfried or Sweeney.

The Housemaid is an unusual type of movie to be released at a time of year when most films are either those aiming for awards or more family-friendly fare. Despite its many flaws, it’s still an enjoyable watch that features a variety of crazy scenarios not typically seen in movies nowadays.

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The Housemaid is now playing in theaters.

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