The Handmaid's Tale

Though helmer Volker Schlondorff succeeds in painting the bleakness of this extrapolated future, he fails to create a strong and persistent connection with the heroine’s plight. Read full review

It's a beautifully austere piece of work -- it's rare to see a film these days that's as carefully designed as this one. But the design hasn't been given enough human contours. It's as if the film makers had forgotten the raging emotions that all that design and austerity were supposed to repress. [07 Mar 1990, p.F1]

Though the movie version of Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale isn't as powerful as its source material, there are enough stark, unnerving images here to give the effort an Orwellian potency all its own. [17 Mar 1990, p.1D]

At the end of the movie we are conscious of large themes and deep thoughts, and of good intentions drifting out of focus. Read full review

The finale isn't quite as chillingly nerve-wracking as one would hope. Schloendorff, who also made The Tin Drum, directs with a uniform dullness that creates little sense of suspense. In replaying the Atwood novel, he and Pinter ultimately fail to create a significant timbre of their own to make the transmogrification truly effective. Read full review

If the movie stands between good old messy, toxic America and depraved Gilead, blessed be it. But alas, it's unlikely to appeal to the converted, much less bona fide brimstone eaters. And one can't help but wonder why a woman didn't direct this movie about women being dominated by men. Read full review

The Handmaid’s Tale is watchable, but it’s also paranoid poppycock — just like the book. Read full review

Comes across as a TV movie and overall, a disappointment - a high calibre cast and concept completely squandered. Read full review

Sadly, the faults in the film lie in Harold Pinter's uncharacteristically bland script, and often woefully inadequate design and direction: the latter often missing opportunities in key scenes, the former full of rather tacky and silly uniforms, symbols, vehicles, and particularly crass watchtowers. Read full review

The heavy-handed direction by Volker Schlondorff doesn't help to make the movie convincing or dramatically effective. [16 Mar 1990, p.54]

Pinter's adaptation is uninspired, and this half-heartedness, combined with Schlondorff's heavy-handedness, serves to crush Atwood's feminist concerns through overkill and to turn a provocative novel into a screen polemic that invites no discussion. This isn't filmmaking; it's haranguing by celluloid. Read full review