Old Boy (2003)

Came across the title of this movie somewhere, can't remember now it was a really long time ago, and a group were discussing the storyline. It is a popular Korean movie. Well, it sure got my attention with its twisted, yet fascinating, turn of events. You will have to watch it to know what I'm talking about. The storyline is bizarre, just the idea is actually pretty original. At the beginning the viewer is pretty much hanging by a thread, on the verge of bursting out of his/her demand what was the reason that got all those unfortunate things inflicted on the main character. At moments I felt overcome with the information that was slowly unrevealed. So twisted, I can't get it out of my mind no matter how hard I try. There is a good reason this movie is so well-known. It earned it.

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The title of this movie has been haunting me for about a year now. When I finally decided to watch it, I didnt regret it. Great action, great actors and dashes of comedy here and there. The comedy scenes were quick but highly effective as you need some kind of comedic relief in movies like this. As the movie progresses, your level of frustration gets almost as high as Dae-Su's, wanting to know WHY he was held captive!

When I finally get to know the reason of his captivity..........I was disappointed. Also,the ending makes you question the validity of the situation, which I really hate when movies do that. Despite that,there were many, many twists and turns. I enjoyed the time I watched this and would highly recommend this movie to others. I also suggest that sensitive people DO NOT watch this film. If you know that you can't handle violent or sexual content, don't even bother watching this movie and then give it a low rating. That would be illogical.

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This is a hard movie for me to rate, and review, because I have such mixed feeling about it. Old Boy is an expertly told thriller, full of suspense, that I simultaneously loved and hated.

What I absolutely loved was the beginning. I would even dare to call it the best beginning of a revenge story that I've ever seen. From the opening moments to the time he is finally free, I was on the edge of my seat. Oh Dae-Su's transformation is also amazing to watch, and I was completely impressed with Choi Min Sik's performance.

From there we get to the heart of the revenge story. Oh Dae-Su's search for the man who ruined his life is full of intrigue. Yoo Ji Tae brilliantly plays the antagonist Lee Woo Jin, with a really creepy sophistication. There's also an epic hallway battle scene, that shows some amazing direction, and is pretty iconic. I was falling completely in love with this movie, and then there's Mi do...

It's hard for me to express how much I hated this character. At first she seemed interesting, but then it was clear that her character would be weak, and shallow. I watched a rescreening of this film recently, and overheard two women complaining in the bathroom about how offended they were by her character, and how this ruined the movie for them. I was also offended. Then there's a minor character, Lee Soo Ah, who I found to be equally shallow, and offensive. I cannot blame the actresses, these characters were simply written poorly. The female characters are my first major problem with this film.

The other issue I had was with the ending. The story behind Oh Dae-Su's kidnapping, and how this revenge story is resolved, is meant to be shocking, but I thought it was just ridiculous. Some people may love the over the top story, with it's controversial subject matter, but I thought it was too unbelievable to take seriously. This was a major let down after loving the beginning so much. The end just kept on adding shocking twist, on top of shocking twist, and then ended in a bloody confrontation that was also shocking. When it was all over I felt like I had watched two different movies. I definitely preferred the beginning movie over the end movie.

I can agree that this is a well made film, and very original, but I can't exactly say that I liked it. I would still recommend it because of the parts that were exceptionally well done. The great moments are what stayed with me once it was over, and made me almost forget why I didn't really like it.

It's also worth seeing if you're simply in the mood to watch something twisted.

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To be honest, this movie is a masterpiece but I still can't find it in me to give it a ten because it's not perfect. It's more a 9.5 in that it is very close to perfection. For one, you have to sit through a lot to get to the meat of the plot and once you do, it will blow your socks off! It's a riveting tale of vengeance unlike any other. Hideously original and captivating and I don't say that loosely. At the end, I was screaming like a little girl telling everyone, you have to watch this. However, the ending is very typical of Park Chan Wook who for some odd reason feels a necessity to over reach. A lot of his movies should end at a certain point but he always unnecessarily drags the ending by adding scenes that have no importance. However, the movie delivered in a way that I hadn't expected.

This movie is hideously raved about and every time, something is raved about like this, I go in with cynicism and even as I tried to resist this, I was sucked in and it has become one of my favorite movies. The great Choi Min Sik starres in this as an "ajeossi" who is randomly imprisoned for fifteen years. He is then freed with a burning curiosity. The need to find out why he was imprisoned for fifteen years. That truly is the plot and of course there's so much more and if I say anymore it becomes a spoiler as this requires you to take on a camera lense view in also trying to find out why. Why did his captor do this? It's what kept me till the end even though some moments dragged and I thought some moments were pointless until the ending. There is a huge twist that is guaranteed to blow your mind.

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what a sick sick movie. this was just a dark, thrilling, twisted, sick show and the music dint help the situation. everything is just cold like there doesnt seem to be any happy moments. i cant even begin to describe whats going on coz the summary just says it all. its an interesting story and keeps u on ur toes but the idea behind is whats sickening. anyways i wonder what the american movie will do, probably end up being banned by some people coz of the message it portrays.
aside from all this, choi min sik is just the johnny depp of korea. he's so freaking talented in every show and he's always the best bad guy. in i saw the devil, he was freaking excellent though he was sickening too. i hope he got several oscars for his acting in his movies

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Let me talk about the television which is Dae-su's companion when we was imprisoned for 15 years. Why a television? Because television is a reflection of society. The imprisonment is made much more vengeful because of the fact that there's a TV. Dae-su is seeing life outside of the room but he cannot touch it, he cannot feel it, he cannot live it. Instead, he was forced to live through it, where he gained his knowledge and how he got by. Seeing how things are outside, makes the longing to get out more hurtful isn't it? Of course, his struggle inside was shown through his repeated silting of his wrist, talking to himself and so on, but it's also that TV (which seems to harmless) that actually does the most harm.

That's Chan-wook's little insert right there. The original manga that Oldboy is loosely based on isn't as grim as this adaptation. The film was dark and an powerful revenge story with one of the best plot twists ever. (Sadly, I have known the plot twist even before watching the film but it didn't take away the effectiveness of the reveal.) Dae-su is a grimier version of the original manga's lead which complements the story and the revenge so much more. It is brutal and filled with madness just like Dae-su himself. Chan-wook knows how to keep his cards, as if a knife is as the edge of your throat until he carefully laid each one out.

For a dark film with dark overtones and gritty visuals, the use of music contrasts the overall aesthetics. Playing Vivald's Four Seasons is a great way to bring out the mayhem and intensity of the film especially during action scenes filled with dramatic build-up. The cinematography reminds me of Netsuya Nakashima's The World of Kanako. While Oldboy doesn't use the same fast-crazy-cuts, it still does it during intense scenes which heightens the suspense.

My favorite scene is the corridor fight scene which was taken in one go. Definitely felt natural and real. Choi Min-sik is great as Dae-su so as Yoo Ji-tae (who is also in Memories of Murder) which serves as Dae-su's contrast both in appearance and personality. I'm not sure if it's intentional in Chan-wook's behalf but the great use of Oedipus Rex (best if you're familiar with it) just amazing it setting out the story and characters.

Oldboy deserves the praise it gets and the hype it has. It strips its characters bare and lays out their deepest and darkness parts but never tells you to hate or love them, instead you as a viewer, make that decision. It shows rawness and boldness just like how its story goes.

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This is by far the best Korean movie I have ever had the pleasure of watching. It starts off suspenseful, then it gets a little lighthearted, and then it just wraps up in the most disturbing way. So many emotions packed into one 2 hour movie. I will never, ever stop thinking about the ending and how the whole story wrapped out. I don't know what to feel. You'll wish it wasn't true. You'll want to wash your eyes out with soap after learning it. You'll be sad, confused, and bittersweet at the same time. That is the sole reason why the rewatch value is a 8/10. You will never experience the ending the same way as your 1st time around. A fantastic movie, although the plot twists were what made me award this movie a masterpiece. Go watch this movie. You will not regret it!

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Park Chan-Wook’s Bloodthirsty Magnum Opus ...

It is hard to truly understand what to expect when first diving into Park Chan-wook‘s 2003 cult-classic “Oldboy”.

It could be considered a “mystery”, a “bloodthirsty revenge- thriller” or even an ill-fated romance story. Regardless of how you look at “Oldboy” , however, it's predominantly a tale which plays out upon to make viewers revel in horror and contemplate the deeper meanings captured in each spellbinding frame behind this film.

Director Park Chan-wook starts with a great premise, and uses it as a springboard for a flawed-yet-compelling
tale of the our main protagonist Oh Dae-su ( Choi Min-sik)’s surreal and nightmarish journey to discover why he was locked up in a single room for 15 years in solitude. As the tale progresses, we are introduced to the thrilling
cat-and-mouse games between and the mysterious businessman , Lee Wu-jin (Yu Ji-tae), with the vulnerable female love interest Mido (Kang Hye-jeong) caught in the crossfire.

“Oldboy “above all of Chan-Wook’s works, might distract from the events depicted, except they are just as unexpected and unpredictable. Since the story is told from Dae-su's point-of-view, the viewer as much in the dark as he is, and we are just as desperate for answers as Dae-Su. Wu-jin proves to be a top-notch villain. For every move that Dae-su makes, his opponent is at least one step ahead of him with violence typically at the forefront .

On the surface, Park’s variety of filmic bloodshed is represented with animalistic savagery. The director avoids glamorising the content and implies violence by cleverly cutting around the acts themselves. But the gory details are unimportant, thus they are not shown. This is a revenge story much more than making viewers want to wince at the implication of nails being pulled out and severed tongues. Finding a difficult balance between method and story, Park instills purely emotional responses in his viewers and it is truly emotionally exhausting.


Choi Min-sik undeniably captures the brilliance of a man consumed by unbearable, unassuageable emotion with the necessary primal drives towards his own survival and revenge. In one of the movie’s most captivating and violent scenes, Dae-su is shown to hold up a hammer with contemptuous emotions lingering upon his face.
A white dotted line then appears on the screen, joining his weapon and his victim's. Then, the cutthroat action emerges. Park Chan-Wook’s camera follows Dae-Su’s sudden race down a narrow corridor as he takes down dozens of opponents, in an extraordinary moment of cinema and the humanised emotions of Dae-Su’s expressions as he begins his rampage down the hall.

Yet, the true humanity of the movie is served in the relationship between Dae-su and Mido. Kang Hye-jeong did undeniably capture the naive innocence of her role as Mido; a young woman caught up between the role as helper, protector and lover of Dae-Su. Undeniably, however, Hye-Jeong’s acting did sometimes come off a little lacklustre in comparison to her costars Min-Sik and Yu Ji-Tae, however, she was still able to channel the assertion to viewers of “ Oldboy” in later scenes that this this is not your typical love story, and later
revelations for viewers will certainly serve to provide this assertion as true. After all, revenge films, like their subject matter, are "best served cold."

Dae-Su’s true opponent , however, turns out to be a suave sociopath called “Lee” played astoundingly by Yu Ji-tae. Lee is the essence of a brilliant villain who seemingly has everything :money, success, a beautiful apartment and a flawless appearance, yet the call for his own profound role as the true antagonist of the film manifests through a final game with Dae-Su which entails his unusual motives.

The ending is an undeniable cliffhanger, leaving viewers confused and pondering upon Oh Dae-su’s decisions. Left with our uncertainties, Park allows the viewer to pass their own judgment, however, there’s no doubt that any answer comes with its own disturbing spin, leaving the viewer in an uncomfortable position no matter what their outcome.

“ Oldboy” isn't for everyone, but it offers a breath of fresh air to anyone fed up of the predictable and tame setups of Hollywood thrillers. This is a movie drenched in a bloodbath of violence, yet it still balances the scales of contemplative and profound story writing with twists straight out of Shakespeare’s tragedies , and a villain established with his own emotive flaws and interests for viewers. A definite watch.

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Masterpiece in everyway

The movie, that brought me to Korean world.

I came to know about Oldboy when I watched unofficial remake or similar film, "Zinda lit: Alive" (2006) and found out that film had uncanny resemblance and plot elements similar to Korean film, which itself is an adaption of Japanese manga of same name.

Ebert summed the film that, "we are so accustomed to 'thrillers' that exist only as machines for creating diversion that it's a shock to find a movie in which the action, however violent, makes a statement and has a purpose".

The captor and his prisoner, went through gravest pains for their mistakes. Avenging for the most dearest sole he lost at the hand of his prisoner, the captor took revenge in the most jaw dropping cliffhanger of all time. The film depicts the gruesome revelation of truths, oppressions and pain.

Sadly, it also shows, human above all - are the most cruel living beings on planet earth.

IT IS HANDS DOWN THE BEST REVENGE FILM OF ALL TIME.

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"Even though I'm no better than a beast, don't I deserve the right to live?"

Oldboy was an unflinching violent revenge film that would have made a Greek tragedy blush. I watched this film during its 20th anniversary year and the production values held up. The storytelling's misogynistic overtones dated it and didn't hold up as well. I've not mentioned any of the major plot twists in this review.

Choi Min Shik as the deeply flawed Oh Dae Soo did a marvelous job transitioning from drunk, philandering husband to confused, bitter prisoner to vengeful vigilante searching for answers. Yoo Ji Tae made a decidedly creepy and vengeful Lee Woo Jin. The two men whose lives were intertwined by a careless comment were at their best when playing cat and mouse.

The action scenes showed that nearly anything can be transformed into a weapon. You may never see toothbrushes the same. A hallway fight leading to an elevator fight were truly iconic and I can see where they influenced many other fight scenes in television and film. Dae Soo's commitment verging on insanity was frighteningly powerful.

Where the film failed me were the women's roles. Their very existence seemed to be as vessels of the men's lust and "love". They played into the men's circle of vengeance with no real identities. Of course, they were necessary to have several gratuitous bare breast shots and being threatened with sexual violence. Mi Do accepted it as perfectly normal when Dae Soo attempted to rape her. And the final plot twist, sick as it was, once again left her without any choice or agency of her own.

While Woo Jin's revenge long game was vile, the film seemed determined to make Dae Soo as unsympathetic as possible from beginning to end. His one moment of empathy was cut short by self-gratification. In the end the film doubled-down on his troubling personality. There was no redemption arc, no moment of healing, no positive character growth, only primal animal instincts. As a thought exercise in tearing away the veneer of civilization, the film succeeded in a disturbing manner.

9/2/23

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Alright. Honestly I just watched it, so it's pretty fresh in my head. I didn't watch it for awards, or even for the actors. I had known the title only, and thought "Okay I finally found it. Let's watch this now."

I am in the boat where I won't openly say I hate or love this film. I'm in lukewarm water just soaking this plot in.

The characters are a little flat for me.. not all, but I didn't really connect with Oh Dae Su's character all that well. I did, it just didn't lunge me forward. I got his character and his need to find out why he was put there for 15 years, but then at the very end not sure I was for it. Still his acting was way aboveboard and it suited this film immensely. Mido's character for me was really only there to move plot inch by inch forward. There was slight appreciation for them not breaking her illusion for lack of a better way to say that. Yoo Ji Tae's character. Well I am a fan of him. He's a great actor with lots of dimension. His character in this movie kind of helped me out a lot. His steadfastness in his journey, his outlook, and his beliefs.

The premise is different, and the action sequences were pretty ace. A good use of plain bloody gore + mental anguish. I will admit certain scenes made me cringe. The bodily harm to more than one character that was shown so visually. The end twists were cringe worthy sure, but without them I'm not sure if Yoo Ji Tae's revenge would have paid off for him as well as it did. Not sure if he was smiling, so the world smiled with him; or if he was weeping so the world wept with him. It wasn't one of my favourite films, but I wouldn't say its a bad film. Its a very psychological, dark, and well paced film. It will keep you guessing/supporting until the end.

Sara Rojas APRIL 22 2018

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