Lady Love Conquers All

Allow me to put my cards on the table right from the getgo, I love the movie Bound. For those of you who don't know it was the film put together by the Wachowski brothers (now sisters) to show off their skills in order to be allowed to make the Matrix (and its subsequent weak sequels). Bound is a film noir of sorts where a couple of women who have begun a relationship conspire to screw the mob out of a ton of cash before eloping together to spend their days doing whatever they damn well please.

As a movie Bound is masterfully crafted (this was long before the days of Jupiter Ascending) and the acting is brilliant. True there are a couple of lesbian sex scenes in the film that will appeal to any red blooded male but beyond that one of the lesbians in question is played by my favourite actress Jennifer Tilly which I am not ashamed to admit makes this film even more watchable in my opinion (it's OK though as my wife knows all about my Tilly infatuation).

However the purpose of this review is not to talk about the Wachowski siblings or their debut feature, no in this review I want to take a look at the latest offering from one of my favourite directors Park Chan Wook, a man who in my opinion created one of the greatest movies of all time in the form of Oldboy which is not to be confused with the godawful Hollywood remake that was frankly an insult to the originals sheer awesomeness.

In fact Chan Wook is responsible for one of my favourite trilogies of all time in the Vengeance Trilogy of which the aforementioned Olboy was a part. He is also responsible for movies such as I'm a Cyborg and one third of the movie Three Extremes (which I wouldn't recommend to anyone who is squeamish). The bottom line is that for my money he is one of the best film makers in the world today although his work may have passed you by if you have an objection to movies with subtitles (in case you hadn't guessed Mr Chan Wook is Korean).

So what does all of this have to do with either Bound or more specifically ladies of the lesbian persuasion I hear you ask? Well Chan Wooks latest film (which he also wrote just like all his other movies) the Handmaiden shares story beats with the Wachowskis work and also features a love affair between its two female leads, although Chan Wook takes the explicitness of his sex scenes a helluva lot further than anything shown in Bound. In fact I would go so far as to say its all a little too much in this film which seems odd as normally I'd be all for pushing boundaries in this manner, who knows maybe I'm getting too old for such excitement!!

The film begins with a conman who is masquerading as Count Fujiwara, a nobleman who is attempting to woo and marry a wealthy women by the name of Lady Hideko who lives with her uncle Kouzuki who intends to marry her himself and who has kept her locked indoors since she was a child, he also has something secret locked in the basement that a young Hideko grew up scared of.

Hideko however is a bit simple so Fujiwara enlists the help of a pickpocket by the name of Sook-Hee who he convinces to get a job as Hidekos handmaiden in order to help convince her to marry him. After taking the job Sook-Hee begins to fall in love with Hideko and realises that she wants no part of Fujiwaras plan although he forces her to stay onboard. So they convince Hideko to run away and after she marries Fujiwara and is then taken to the madhouse where he intends to have her locked away in order that he can make off with her fortune.

Once there however the first twist in the plot is revealed when it is Sook-Hee who is locked away after Fujiwara and his new bride lie and tell the doctors that Sook-Hee is Hideko which was in fact Hidekos plan all along as we discover that she is not the wallflower she appears to be and is in fact just looking for a way out of her torment under the rule of her uncle.

So Sook-Hee is locked away and we are treated to the story of Hideko by way of flashback as we discover that she has been forced to read pornographic stories to her uncle and several other men throughout her life and that at one point Fujiwara became part of this crowd but only to push ahead with his plan which he then concocts with Hideko. What we also learn however is that Hideko falls in love with Sook-Hee during their liasons together so it is in fact Fujiwara who is being played for a fool as his scheme with Hideko to formulate a false scheme with Sook-Hee is in fact a false scheme in itself which is part of the grand scheme of Hideko and Sook-Hee (I hope you're keeping up).

Sook-Hee breaks out of the nuthouse and Hideko drugs Fujiwara. The two women then prepare to flee together whilst Fujiwara is picked up by Kouzukis men who take him back to their boss who is not amused by the treachery he has suffered, treachery made worse by the fact that before they ran away Hideko and Sook-Hee destroyed his collection of rare and valuable porn books.

The ladies make their escape (cue another explicit sexual encounter) whilst Fujiwara is tortured by Kouzuki in the basement which contains an aquarium with a bloody huge octopus in it. There is something of a hint that maybe Hideko had been forced to have sex with the sea creature but I may just have been reading between the lines a little with that one. In the end both Fujiwara and Kouzukis end up dead from the smoke produced by Fujiwaras mercury soaked cigarettes and the film ends with some Thelma and Louise style still shots of the main protagonists.

In all honesty I'm not sure I really enjoyed this film. The first act which was all about the plan from Sook-Hees perspective did drag for my tastes and I found myself a little bored by the proceedings which is strange because the likes of Oldboy don't exactly chug along at a million miles per hour but in the Handmaiden it just feels like nothing of any note os actually taking place. From the first twist onwards however (when it appears that Fujiwara and Hideko have double-crossed Sook-Hee the film picks up and I found myself more invested in the events as they unfolded.

One thing I will say though is that the second twist which saw the ladies screw Fujiwara over was fairly evident from quite a long way out and I am normally someone who doesn't get plot twists until they're smacking me in the face. This is a bit of a let down as the twist in Oldboy (sorry to keep going back to that film) is so out of left field that anyone who claims they knew what was coming is nothing more than a damn liar.

Now don't get me wrong the Handmaiden has alot going for it. The story is well told (apparently it's based on a 2002 novel called Fingersmith by Sarah Waters) and all of the actors play their parts with the sort of skill we have come to expect from Chan Wook but when held up to some of his earlier work it just feels a little underwhealming if I'm being honest and it certainly has something of a Bound vibe about it (this may be true of the novel too but having never read it I just don't know if thats the case).

Is the Handmaiden worth watching? If you're a fan of Chan Wooks then absolutely you should watch this film and the same can be said for anyone who may want a bit of titulation in the midst of their double cross movie. If however you're one of those people who doesn't like to have to read when watching a film then this is probably not the film that is going to change your stance on the subject (for the record you're missing out on a world of terrific cinema by not checking out the world movies section of your local dvd shop).

All of which just leaves the scoring of the film which has become the norm in these reviews and in the case of the Handmaiden I'm going to give it 6.5 out of 10. Yes I ended up enjoying it but I had to go through a bit of a slog to get there and so I don't feel I can give it any higher a mark than this.