The Handmaiden': a new masterpiece from Park Chan-wook

This review contains plot details of'The Handmaiden'PARK CHAN-WOOK began his career as a critic rather than an auteur. The film that persuaded the acclaimed Korean director that his calling lay behind the camera rather than bathed in the light of the screen was 'Vertigo' (1958), Alfred Hitchcock's twisted tale of love, terror, voyeurism, deceit and assumed identities. It is fitting that Mr Park's 'The Handmaiden' deftly deals with many of the same themes. It is so masterly that it too is likely to inspire a new generation of film-makers.'The Handmaiden' opens with a young Korean woman, Tamako (Kim Tae-ri), handing over a baby to a sobbing familial group in a poor, mud-sodden neighbourhood. She is leaving to be a maid for the niece of a wealthy Japanese scholar, Kouzuki. Approached by a grand, tree-lined drive, Tamako's new home is an enormous pile in a chimerical hybrid of Japanese and English styles, complete with a baffling array of annexes, wings, a bower-filled garden and secret basement complex. As it transpires, this house makes an apt setting for the film, in which nothing and no one are quite what they seem. Just as the footprint of the house...Continue reading
Click here to read full news..