A small triumph the debut feature by Argentine filmmaker Jorge Gaggero depicts the effect of Argentina's economic meltdown on the relationship between a formerly wealthy businesswoman and her servant of 30 years.

| Aug 27, 2019

Full Review | Original Score: 5/5 | Nov 18, 2011

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Nov 17, 2011

Live-in Maid is a study of two women who appear not to like each other very much, yet their link makes for a moving drama about friendship.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Oct 19, 2007

[A] simply told, but emotionally robust movie.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Oct 19, 2007

It paints a lovely, intimate portrait of a complex relationship and shows a side of Latin American life we rarely see on American screens.

| Original Score: 4.5/5 | Oct 18, 2007

A vivid portrait of a society in the midst of wrenching change, but it transcends its immediate context to become a thoughtful, even unforgettable, chamber piece, performed with exquisite subtlety by two fine actresses.

| Sep 20, 2007

Live-In Maid is a modest chamber piece enriched by its affecting human harmonies and overtones.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Aug 31, 2007

Even if I knew how things turned out in Live-In Maid, a fine Argentinean film with English subtitles, I wouldn't give away the ending.

| Aug 30, 2007

Live-in Maid is a fascinating directorial exercise in observing characters whose long history together is coming to an end.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/4 | Aug 10, 2007

Writer-director Gaggero shoots for a kind of docu-realism, with a few overtly cinematic interludes, like one well-paced split-screen sequence.

Full Review | Original Score: B- | Jul 21, 2007

They [Aleandro and Argentina] take what could be clichd characters and turn them into living, breathing people that viewers can care about.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Jul 20, 2007

Weary and overworked to her very bones, Dora nevertheless has a heart of gold and a spine of steel. The movie does, too.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Jul 20, 2007

The actresses bring warmth and complexity to their stock roles, magnifying class struggle through their intriguing back-and-forths.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Jul 20, 2007

...it's a wrenching, often painful comedy with its roots in Bergman and Bresson and Chekhov, as well as in the extremely unfunny condition of the Argentine economy. Not a shot or a sentence or a line is wasted.

| Jul 19, 2007

First-time filmmaker Jorge Gaggero manages to distill a remarkable quantity of poetic gold and psychological truth from this simplest of set-ups, peeling away the shared history of these women with brief but telling snippets of information.

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/4 | Jul 19, 2007

The small, well-acted chamber drama is a genre that has virtually disappeared from American screens, which is too bad when you see one as accomplished as Live-in Maid.

Full Review | Jul 18, 2007

Live-In Maid, Jorge Gaggero's remarkably assured first film, examines the complicated relationship between an upper-class Buenos Aires woman and her housekeeper.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Jul 18, 2007

A fairly successful attempt at satire, though given the subject, there's a lot of darkness under the carpet.

| Jul 17, 2007

A film of startling insight and grace.

| Jul 17, 2007