Oldboy (Chan-wook Park, 2005)

A buddy of mine calls Oldboy the “most unjustified revenge (story) in the history of the world.” He might be right… but it doesn’t matter either way, because by the time the tale winds down, the film is only loosely interested in the act of revenge. The end of the film concentrates the story on how even the smallest triviality in one’s life can affect another’s exponentially. That’s what all that talk about, “Be it a rock or a grain of sand, in water they sink as the same” means. Revenge is the hook – it is the second film in Chan-wook Park’s “Vengeance Trilogy” after all – but examining the weight of your actions is the real focus. Oh Dae-Su (Min-sik Choi) starts the film as an overweight, drunken mess of a man. He’s been arrested and his brother has come to bail him out, with Dae-Su all the while acting like a petulant, uncontrollable child. The two wander into the alley only after Oh Dae-Su has turned back and taunted his captors. His brother heads off to make a phone call for him (it’s his daughter’s birthday) but when he calls for Dae-Su, he’s gone. We find out soon after that Oh Dae-Su has been abducted, penned up in a crummy, ramshackle apartment. He’s kept there and fed through a slot at the foot of the door, treated like an animal. Dae-Su spends his days training for battle, writing notebooks-worth of regrets and enemies, searching for who’s to blame and for ways out of his cage. 15 years pass. At about the time he’s finally burrowed through the wall, Dae-Su wakes up on the roof of a building… payback the only thing on his mind. The rest of the film finds Oh Dae-Su in a blindingly rage, searching for the person responsible for his imprisonment, tracking down clues and most of all the reason “WHY?” What results is a largely brilliant, sometimes convoluted, fit of furious vengeance. There are some grotesquely bloody scenes scattered throughout (both at Oh Dae-Su’s benefit and expense) and also what may possibly be the single greatest fight scene in the history of filmmaking, a one-shot bravura hallway hammer fight sequence pitting Dae-Su against a gang of men that made me absolutely giddy with delight. Chan-wook Park certainly does not let it fall into the usual, simplified one-on-one fistfight. Again, Park’s filmmaking skills are in full effect – this dude is mad talented - but Oldboy has less winking at the camera than his predecessor did (Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance) and thus works better, because Park’s decisions are for the betterment of his story… and not just to humor himself. That’s what makes Oldboy such a fantastic film, not only it’s hugely rewarding storyline, but the chance to watch a filmmaker come into his own.