When Fingersmith was published in 2002, it was lauded as a gripping historical thriller—rich in companionship, rebellion, and escape, yet firmly rooted in genre conventions. But when Park Chan-wook, a filmmaker renowned for making crime and mystery feel visceral, reimagined its Victorian-era tale within the charged backdrop of colonial-era Korea, The Handmaiden became something else entirely. More than just an adaptation, it’s a film that transcends comparison—a lush, intoxicating study of desire, power, and submission breaking past its limits.

Beyond its evocative exploration of colonialism’s grip on the human mind, The Handmaiden (Original title: Ah-ga-ssi) wields eroticism like few films dare—so sharp and unvarnished in its aestheticism that other artistic depictions of desire seem almost timid in comparison. But at its core, this is a smart, subversive tale of two women outgrowing the petty, calculated power plays of a patriarchal world. Through the lens of a...