Set in 1930s Korea during the Japanese occupation, director Park Chan-wook's romantic melodrama revolves around Sookee (Kim Tae-ri), who is recruited to help a con-man known as Count Fujiwara (Ha Jung-woo) in his plans to seduce the lovely and lonely Lady Hideko (Kim Min-hee) in order to obtain her large inheritance. Sookee is a new maid to the aristocratic Japanese heiress, who lives in a magnificent manor house deep in the woods with her tyrannical uncle Kouzuki (Cho Jin-woong), an avid collector of rare exotic books (his tongue has turned black from licking his ink brushes). Sookee has been groomed since childhood to marry Kouzuki (Hideko tells Sookee that, when Hideko was little, her deranged aunt hung herself from a cherry tree and has become a ghost). With Sookee firmly established in the sumptuous household, the fraudulent Count arrives, explaining that he's a painter from an impoverished noble family. Kouzuki hires him to forge illustrations for new books that can then be sold as originals. One evening, Kouzuki invites several potential clients to a formal reading of sadomasochistic stories from his collection. Dressed in full geisha attire and exuding a shimmering sexuality, Hideko artfully entices and arouses her audience. What the gentlemen don't realize is that Hideko and Sookee are engaged in a lesbian love affair, satisfying their intimate desires and setting their own goals. So who is manipulating whom? Based on Welsh novelist Sarah Waters's 2002 novel Fingersmith (originally set in Victorian England), this is a lushly atmospheric tale, cleverly told from multiple points-of-view. Recommended. (S. Granger)
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