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| Oldboy |
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List Price: $22.95
Buy New: $15.00
You Save: $7.95 (35%)
Buy New/Used/Collectible from $15.00
Avg. Customer Rating:  (based on 105 reviews)
Sales Rank: 1633
Category: DVD
Actors: Min-sik Choi, Ji-tae Yu
Director: Chan-wook Park
Format: Ac-3, Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, Dubbed, Subtitled, Widescreen, Ntsc
Languages: Korean (Original Language), English (Subtitled), Spanish (Subtitled), English (Dubbed)
Rating: R (Restricted)
Media: DVD
Running Time: 120 minutes
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.2
Dimensions (in): 7.1 x 5.4 x 0.6
UPC: 842498030042
EAN: 0842498030042
ASIN: B0009S2T0M
Release Date: August 23, 2005
Theatrical Release Date: 2004
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Editorial Reviews:
Amazon.com
In the realm of revenge thrillers, you'd be hard pressed to find more ultra-violent vengeance and psycho thrills than in the creepy story of Oldboy. This Korean import made a pop splash at the Cannes Film Festival and during its limited theatrical run thanks to the imprimatur of Quentin Tarantino, who raved about it and its visionary director, Chan-wook Park, to anyone who would listen. It's easy to see why QT fell in love with the grindhouse attitude, fast-paced action, violent imagery, and icy-black humor, but it's a disservice to think of Oldboy as another Tarantino homage or knockoff. The darkly existential undercurrent in the themes that Oldboy traces over its life-long narrative arc is much more complex and deeply disturbing than anything of its kind. The movie's tagline is, "15 years of imprisonment... 5 days of vengeance." The imprisonee is Oh Dae-Su, an ordinary Joe who is snatched off a Seoul street corner and locked away in a dank, windowless fleabag hotel room for the aforementioned 15 years. Just as abruptly he is released, and thus the five days begin. Why did this happen to Oh Dae-Su? Ah, but that would be telling, and in fact we don't know ourselves until the final wrenching scenes.
Oldboy breaks into a classic three-act saga, the first of which details the hallucinatory period of imprisonment in which Oh Dae-Su wades from mild insanity to outright psychosis in the hands of unseen yet attentive captors. Act 2 is the revenge, when an entirely different tone takes over and Oh Dae-Su moves with single-minded purpose and clarity. It's this section that has gained the most notoriety, primarily for the claw-hammer dentistry scene, the one-man-army tracking shot, and the wriggling octopus that Oh Dae-Su consumes in a sushi bar (he's been dead so long he simply needs life back inside him in any way possible). In act 3, answers finally start to emerge and the sinister atmosphere grows even more profound--not without a healthy dose of extra bloodletting, of course. Oldboy is an undeniably poetic masterpiece of tension, fury, and dynamic craft. Ultimately, its epic cycle of tragedy is of the sort that mankind has been inflicting upon itself for all time. Some of the images may be gruesome, but all converge into a kind of beauty. It's in the telling of this lurid tale that these details become one and the memories of pain ultimately heal. --Ted Fry
Description
Oh Dae-su is an ordinary Seoul businessman with a wife and little daughter who, after a drunken night on the town, is abducted and locked up in a strange, private prison. No one will tell him why hes there and who his jailer is and his fury builds to a single-minded focus of revenge. 15 years later, he is unexpectedly freed, given a new suit, a cell-phone and 5 days to discover the mysterious enemy who had him imprisoned. Seeking vengeance on all those involved, he soon finds that his enemys tortures are just beginning.
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Customer Reviews: Read 100 more reviews...
 I can only give the mvie a 3, but a 5 for the dvd release June 17, 2006
Now I enjoyed this movie very much. But only up to a point. I haev heard about these "tartan asia extreme: Enough said, I don't exactly want to dwell on it.
Now the story is VERY ineresting and had me wonderign all the way. Now that was teh point of it, but it really went out of it's way to mget you interested in teh characters. Teh whole revenge factro was just WAY too weird for me and then end is extreme . It, well, no, I can't tell you, you have to see it to believe it. If you are into this kind of sick stuff, it is for you, but the second half of the movie just gets too "extreme" for me. I will check out another one of these some time, but I give it one more chance. Can anyone recomend a "tartan" action movie for me that is not so freakign extreme. Good flick though, very good.
Also the music kicked ass, but the music changes just like the movie does towards the end. I may have gave this 3 stars, but being an action fan, I really enjoyed the realism as well as the unrealism in the fight scenes. Yes he does use that hammer:) The acting was BRILLIANT, story was good, but I only like my stomach turning over when I am watchign a horror. But last reviewr is right, camera angles and overall directorial job is just awesome.
Commentary gives you all types of insight as the director and cinematographer focus mainly on the film and don't really get off topic. They certianly wanted to talk about how they made it, some really good info on the commentary.
In the interview with the director he talks about the violence in his movies, how surprising.
Other goodies iclude deleted sceens and trailers.
Overall I have to say that the special features are superior to pretty much any other all region or region 1 asian dvd. Well, I should say chinese, that's all I really know, but kno a lot.
 Terrific!! June 13, 2006
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
I decided to watch this film because of the suggestion of a friend and I must confess that initially I felt that it would be a vain attempt to understand another Korean movie. I was very wrong! The film is a terrific adventure, full of surprises, excellent story and superb acting! The Korean cinema has definitely some new tricks to show and the story itself is an acrobatics on the edge of human feelings. Love, hate, thirst for revenge, are taking turns under a fine directing touch. This is the best and most enigmatic thriller I have seen in the last few years! Be prepared for some very hard scenes indeed and see the anger making full circles, passing from all the extreme situations!
Please do not read the review written by "None Whatsoever" below - There's spoiler! April 26, 2006
5 out of 6 found this review helpful
This is a great movie and it is so well known in the art house circle that I don't even have to rave about this movie. But, please. Do not read the review by this person. He pretty much gives away the final twist. This is not fair for the people who have not watched the film yet. If you want to enjoy the film, I beg you - please do not read the review!
Best Count of Monte Cristo Ever! April 20, 2006
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
This is the best and most accurate remake of "The Count of Monte Cristo" ever made, bar none. The 1998 French miniseries starring G?rard Depardieu came the closest, especially in terms of strictly following the full plot, but is ruined by the inaccurate ending in the very last few minutes. If you read the full 1300+ version of the Dumas classic, it does not have a happy ending. Dantes does not end up with Mercedes, and even though he learns some redemption and can forgive, he is still torn by what revenge has done to him. In the real version he goes off with his young mistress and is never heard from again, which is actually similar to Oldboy's ending.
Oldboy captures the psychological despair of revenge in a unique and startling way. Two characters play Dumas' protagonist, both Dae-su as Dantes, and Woo-jin as the Count, and the revenge they seek on each other is the war within Dantes/The Count himself.
In the original the Count gets revenge on several of his enemies. This is only implied in the movie. We see other jails maintained by Woo-jin Lee's cohorts, but we never see who is in them. Instead we see only Dae-su, who instead of having the Abbe Faria to teach him, learns from an all-knowing TV, and instead of escaping on his own he is released by...himself of course, Woo-jin Lee.
Park now blends Dae-su's search for those who imprisoned him with a horrific look at the cost of revenge both on himself, and his more elegant version, the Count, the billionare, Woo-jin.
There are several clues throughout the movie that both characters are indeed the Count. In the most overt scene,the girl Mi-do is chatting with Woo-jin, who asks her, "Is the Count of Monte Cristo there?," even though it's clear the Woo-jin is the Count, since he is controlling the whole revenge plot and he is the megarich tycoon. Dae-su immediately recognizes that Woo-jin is the one he is looking for.
Later, Dae-su almost kills Woo-jin, who is protected by a character similar to the Count's mute Nubian slave, Ali. Woo-jin tells Dae-su, "You are the monster I have created." Dae-su is the pure rage of revenge, the wounded and unrefined soul of Edmund Dantes, the evil angel on the Count's shoulder who has consumed his entire being, shown through the extreme violence he inflicts on others, including the ability to kick ass on hordes of attackers and torture them if need be.
In one telling scene Woo-jin explains how he has hypnotized Dae-su and controlled his life. Park splits the screen and blends Dae-su's and Woo-jin's faces together to show they are one and the same person.
In the end Woo-jin comes to terms with Dae-su and having nothing to live for, having spent his revenge, almost kills both himself and Dae-su with a single bullet. Instead he lets Dae-su/Dantes live and the Count is killed off, in the same way that the Count disappears from Europe in the original story.
There is an Oedipal modification to the story with the dual incests of both Dae-su and Woo-jin, which again shows both characters are the same person. Both have lost someone they love. This is Park's wonderful updating of the near killing of Mercedes son, Albert, who could have been Dantes' son if his life had been different. Park's modern update keeps the psychosis of the revenge deep with the characters, as opposed to Dumas' revenge secret, the transferred letter that starts Dantes' imprisonment in motion.
Park's realization of this classic novel is one of the greatest movies ever made. It is a stunning post-modern realization of the novel, and is more tightly bound to the original story than you might think. Read the story and watch the movie twice or as many times as you can. The links will become apparent each time you view it.
From a psychological point of view, this is unquestionably the best remake of the novel both as a story and a movie.
Shakespearean and Oedipal Exploration with Strange Gangster Film Style April 11, 2006
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
This is one of the most unusual films I've ever seen. Combining Kafka, David Lynch, and Tarantino, the film pits a sociopathic sadist against an innocent man as it explores what happens when one becomes a victim of one's own wrath and hunger for revenge. Because so much of the film relies on plot surprises, I will only say that a man tries to avenge his enemy and in the process he encounters his own inner demons.
Perhaps more than any film I've seen, this movie is relentless in its intensity, both inwardly and outwardly. It is one of the most painful films I have ever witnessed but the suffering is not forced or gratituous. It is the result of a deeply thought theme--the tragedy of not knowing the difference between defending one's honor and exacting revenge.
Fans of Mulholland Dr., The Walkabout, A Clockwork Orange, and Kill Bill should enjoy this film.
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Copyright Runningonkarma.com 2006
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