Two Cents is an original column akin to a book club for films. The Cinapse team will program films and contribute our best, most insightful, or most creative thoughts on each film using a maximum of 200 words each. Guest writers and fan comments are encouraged, as are suggestions for future entries to the column. Join us as we share our two cents on films we love, films we are curious about, and films we believe merit some discussion.
The Pick
We’ve had a blast with our series on Korean cinema, spanning everything from the film that helped kickoff the cultural revolution (Oldboy) to some of the latest and greatest works to hit our shores (Train to Busan) to a number of new classics in between.
We’re capping things off by circling back to Park Chan-wook, perhaps the filmmaker most associated with that special flavor of South Korean mayhem, and his latest work, the erotic thriller The Handmaiden.
Set during the occupation of Korea by Japan, The Handmaiden (inspired by the novel Fingersmith by Sarah Waters) follows Kim Tae-ri as Sook-hee, a naive young pickpocket recruited by a slick conman, Count Fujiwara (Ha Jung-woo) to help him bamboozle the lovely, reserved Lady Izumi Hideko (Kim Min-hee). Lady Hideko has spent her life under the cruel control of her uncle, Kouzuki (Cho Jin-woong, who played another indelible monster in our earlier pick A Hard Day), and Fujiwara schemes to seduce her away, claim her fortune, and stick Hideko in an insane asylum.
Things get more complicated from there, not the least of all because of the growing attraction between Sook-hee and Hideko. To reveal any more of the various twists and turns would be a disservice to the carefully constructed game that Park and co-writer Chung Seo-kyung have laid out.
So we put it to the team: Is The Handmaiden a game with playing?
Did you get a chance to watch along with us this week? Want to recommend a great (or not so great) film for the whole gang to cover? Comment below or post on our Facebook or hit us up on Twitter!
Next Week’s Pick:
We lost a true master of American cinema this week with the passing of Jonathan Demme, whose remarkably varied career encompassed comedy, drama, horror, music, and mash-ups of multiple genres unlike anything else in modern cinema.
We’ve decided to pay tribute by watching perhaps his best known film, the horror classic The Silence of the Lambs.
We don’t need to give you the hard sell on this, right? It’s The Silence of the Lambs. Give it a watch and give us a shout.
Would you like to be a guest in next week’s Two Cents column? Simply watch and send your under-200-word review to twocents(at)cinapse.co!
Our Guests
Brendan Agnew
To say that Park Chan-wook’s The Handmaiden is visually impressive is a woeful understatement. There are many feathers in this particular movie’s cap, and a lot of them could have entire essays devoted to them (the wresting of power from oppressive male characters by compelling women, positive representation of non-hetero-normative romances, the importance of proper basement ventilation, etc.), but the way Park uses his frame is an easy trick to miss when digging into the substance of his latest masterpiece.
The Handmaiden is a cracking good time (it flies by for a 2 1/2 hour movie, and plays like gangbusters in spite of the language barrier), a con/heist film where the mark and the prize differ depending what narrator you’re following at any given moment, and how reliable they truly are. Park’s propensity for stuffing his shots with sumptuous scenery here serves a purpose far more than the obvious aesthetic one — as the movie goes on, you start to see around corners and behind closed doors and through bushes at what’s really going on. It’s like the director is daring the audience to find clues that he’s scattered through the scenes of double-dealing and triple-crossing.
Of course, like all great magicians, he’s hidden his best trick in plain sight, balancing between the duality of his two leading ladies. Idealistic but damaged, depraved yet sweet, The Handmaiden is so good that watching it feels like you’re getting away with highway robbery. But, as the film might argue, sometimes just getting away is the most important thing in the world. (@BLCAgnew)
Story is all about the journey, and the journey that The Handmaiden takes you on is absolutely, well, um, mesmerizing. To be honest, I’m mostly just blown away. This film seems to hand and caress every detail. It gazes longingly over its actors, sets and the smallest details, from pairs of scissors to rope in a box to a nail. It screams at you to feel the textures.
But that’s not all, there’s also the immense sound design, which also pores over every detail. This movie just sounds lush and creamy, though at times it feels like walking through freshly dead leafs in the ground.
All of this is for good reason, as The Handmaiden is clearly an erotic thriller of a film that’ll leave you flabbergasted every 40 minutes without fail, yearning to find out what happens next and how it all adds up. I love this movie. (@hsumra)
The Team
Park Chan-wook belongs among that elite circle of directors who actually frighten me enough to make me scared to watch their movies. Takashi Miike, Lars Von Trier, Park Chan-wook… these are artists who wield such power as to make me fear them. I’m a little terrified to ever revisit the Vengeance trilogy, and have never braved a viewing of Thirst. But the Park Chan-wook of Stoker and The Handmaiden is a more refined and obsessed creator, losing none of his bite. In the extreme minority, I actually prefer Stoker over The Handmaiden, but that doesn’t make Handmaiden any less a stunning accomplishment of subversive storytelling, lush production design, impeccable camerawork, and legitimately steamy romance. The twists and turns of this thriller are essential, but perhaps served to distance me from the character work at first. Repeat viewings would likely deepen the experience and elevate the complex female character explorations that are the beating heart underneath the buttoned down thriller. Long live the frightening and ingenious Park Chan-wook. (@Ed_Travis)
Just my luck: I watched The Handmaiden not four feet away from a pair of elderly women who could have been my grandmothers. Normally, that would be no big deal, but what happens in bed (and even worse, what happens in the basement) made this an exercise in collar-tugging.
What kind of story is this then? Depends on the scene. It starts off all subterfuge and intrigue, and morphs into a bittersweet love story. By the end, we’re in an M. Night tornado that resolves just sweet as can be. Rather than a knock, this is actually the highest compliment I can pay The Handmaiden. It not only takes viewers for a wild ride, but it never actually throws them off the train.
So much of the movie is extreme (the sex, the fetishes, the deceit, and eventually, the violence), but the performances are supremely measured. The interaction between all of the main personalities is a choreographed dance of manners and restraint. This does nothing but build the tension, and sure enough, eventually, ultimately, finally there is … release! (@rodmachen)
The Handmaiden is a phenomenal film, easily my favorite of what I’ve seen from the brilliant Park Chan-wook, who is certainly no slouch in the cinematic department. Gorgeous, grotesque, and shockingly funny in places, The Handmaiden also manages to be one of the best con movies I’ve seen since the original Gambit. The way details slowly amass to paint a full portrait, the way the tiniest moments gather momentum to become more and more important, it’s sheer genius.
But maybe what I appreciate most is that Park is now using his cinematic powers for good. His Vengeance trilogy showcased a worldview as bracingly bleak and heartless as any in modern cinema, so it was a tremendous surprise to see just how warm and optimistic The Handmaiden proved to be, shot through with a dizzying romantic heart. Bravo. (@theTrueBrendanF)
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Next week’s pick: