The Handmaid's Tale Movie Review

Starring: Natasha Richardson, Aidan Quinn, Robert Duvall, Faye Dunaway, Elizabeth McGovern

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Review Summary

In the near future, pollution and radiation have reduced female fertility to 1 in 100. A religious and fascistic state -- the Republic of Gilead -- determines that the few women who are capable of bearing children are chosen as "handmaids" to breed with the rich and powerful. Kate (Richardson), a former librarian whose husband was killed and daughter lost while they were trying to escape over the border, is picked by the barren Serena Joy (Dunaway) to bear a child with her powerful husband, "the Commander" (Duvall). An underground rebel force makes contact with Kate as she learns the cross-currents and treacheries of her household. This bleak and sometimes painful film is a decent adaptation of Margaret Atwood's feminist dystopian sci-fi novel, with a screenplay by Harold Pinter. The principals are excellent, Aidan Quinn appears as a chauffeur-soldier in the Commander's household, and McGovern has a meaty supporting role as a lesbian handmaid-in-training who escapes into the prostitute underworld (and ends up looking a bit like Tim Curry in "The Rocky Horror Picture Show"). A real downer, but worth watching.
David Loftus, Resident Scholar

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Ratings are on a 1-10 scale (Low to High)
Plot

Composition of Movie
Actual chase scenes or violence - 10%
Planning/preparing, gather info, debate puzzle - 40%
Feelings, relationships, character bio/development - 50%

**Fantasy or Science Fiction?** - science fiction story
Romance Yes
Repressive Society Yes
Repression: - controls your sex
Inner Struggle Yes
Plotlet: - one culture tries to impose its culture on another group

Main Character
Identity: - Female
Profession/status: - prostitute/concubine
Age: - 20's-30's
Is this an ordinary person caught up in events? Yes
Hair color? - blonde
Hair type - (woman) medium/shoulderlng, wavy
Unclothed? - Chest
Events of movie makes character more... - tougher
Ethnicity/Nationality - White (American)
How sensitive is this character? - sensitive to others' feelings
Intelligence - Smarter than most other characters
Physique - average physique

Secondary Main Character
Identity: - Male
Body type - muscular (man)
Unclothed? - chest
How much in movie? - 40%
Ethnicity/Nationality - White (American)

Main Adversary
Identity: - Male
Age: - 40's-50's
Profession/status: - govt employee
How much of work is main antagonist actually present in: - 60%
Body type - average (man)
Ethnicity - White
Sense of humor? - Cynical sense of humor
Intelligence - Smarter than most other characters
Physical condition - average physique
How sensitive is this character? - hard edged

Setting
Earth setting: - near future (later in 21st century)
Takes place on Earth? Yes
Misc settings - prison - mansion

Style
Accounts of torture and death? - moderately detailed references to deaths
Tone of movie - depressed/sad
Sex/nudity in movie? Yes
What kind of sex: - impregnation/reproduction - actual description of sex - seeing breasts - society controls main character's sexuality
Any profanity? - Occasional swearing
Kinds of F/X - exploding bombs
Is this movie based on a - book

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