Overrated!!!

Rating: 6/10 (20 June 2005)

This film is not bad, but does it deserve to be rated as one of the best films of all times? I think not. When rating a film the most important thing should be, what is the film giving the audience and what is the message that the director is pushing across. In this film the message is not much smarter than your average horror flick, and the only feeling you have after seeing it is disgust. That's not really a bad thing, if it has direction. In films like Seven there is and it can be summed up really easy in the last sentences from Morgan Freeman. "The world is a beautiful place and worth fighting for. I agree with the last part." Because Oldboy lacks a message like this the whole film becomes an empty vessel.
That being say, it might be one of the best empty vessels created. The photography is stunning, the editing is clever and the acting is at most parts really good. The story is smart, but becomes a little to smart at times. It's trying too much to live up to films like Memento, Seven or even The Sixth Sense where everything is revealed in the end. First of all I wasn't that surprised, but the worst part was that I really didn't care.
To sum it up: good film, but not even close of being one of the 1000 best films in history.