The Handmaiden (2016)

	Kim Min-Hie	Lady Hideko
	Kim Tae-Ri	Sook-Hee
	Ha Jung-Woo	Count Fujiwara
	Cho Jin-Woong	Uncle Kouzuki
	Kim Hae-sook	Butler
	Moon So-ri	Aunt of Noble Lady
	Lee Dong-Hwi

Director

Chan-wook Park

Producer

Chan-wook Park
Syd Lim

Music

Yeong-wook Jo

1930s Korea, in the period of Japanese occupation, Sook-hee is hired as a handmaiden to Japanese heiress Hideko, who lives a secluded life on an estate with her domineering Uncle Kouzuki. But the maid has a secret. She and a swindler, who poses as a Japanese Count, are scheming to get the Lady engaged, rob her fortune and lock her up in a madhouse. All proceeds according to plan until Sook-hee starts to truly understand Hideko.

Edition Details
No. of Discs/Tapes	1

Personal Details
Purchase Date	9/28/2018
Location	Personal Library
Owner	Deitz
Store	Amazon.com
Condition	New
Tags	lesbian
Links	+9 Review: QueerGuru (2016 Roger Walter-Dack) +4/4 Review: Roger Ebert (2016 Matt Zoller Seitz) + Review: NY Times (2016 Manohla Dargis) Out: #2 ‡ "15 Greatest Queer Sex Scenes in Film History" The Handmaiden at Core for Movies IMDB TheMovieDb.org Rotten Tomatoes

References
Streaming, VoD	Amazon Prime
Lists	‡ Rotten Tomatoes: 200 Best LGBT Movies of All Time
QueerGuru Rating	9
Rotten Critics Rating % (2021)	95
Rotten Best Queer #1-200 (2021)	14

The Handmaiden certainly isn’t a straightforward film, and if you’re the sort of person who likes to know exactly what’s going on at all points in a movie, you may find it an extremely frustrating experience. But it is a wonderful experience. One of the best films I seen this year. The cinematography is near perfect. While you may pretty much have figured out where the story is going by Part Three, how we get there held me in suspense. There are some very erotic F/F scenes which surprisingly were engossing.