Doesn't Deserve To Be In The IMDb Top 250 List

Rating: 3/10 (30 July 2010)

Some people people have described the South Korean film OLDBOY as challenging . For me the word " challenging " is perhaps most associated as challenging someone to a duel . You see a man walk down the street arm in arm with a woman who is far too good for him so challenge him to a duel . You cross swords literally and kill your opponent where hopefully the woman won't want his death to be in vain so she gives you her heart and soul for all eternity . There can be nothing more romantic than disemboweling or decapitating a man over a hot chick and if you think my way of thinking is grotesque or perverse please watch this film before casting any judgment over my character
OLDBOY is hardly original . Its central core revolves around an anti-hero gaining revenge against someone who wronged him . This is a story influenced by the western genre , the French New Wave and New Hollywood but one suspects this type of plot has been going on since before cinema . The protagonist Dae finds himself confined to a prison of sorts for 15 years where he's occasionally gassed by " the gas Russians use on Chechen terrorists " . Would that be the same gas that the Spetnatz used on a Moscow theater that killed a third of the hostages they were trying to save ? Right away you're drawn to an unlikely plot hole where if Dae is getting gassed over a period of 15 years surely his captors would eventually cock up and give him a fatal dose ? The premise of being confined for 15 years might have worked better in a short film if only because we'd either see the reason for it be revealed after 10 , 15 or 20 minutes or have it left totally enigmatic . Unfortunately we have to endure another 90 minutes of nonsense
The director Chan Wook Park insists on alienating the audience by introducing concepts such as graphic violence such as Dae performing dental surgery on someone's mouth without him being a qualified dentist , surrealism such as a woman seeing a six foot insect sitting on a tube train and most infamously of all animal cruelty where a live octopus is eaten . Park might deserve some congratulations on staging a fight sequence with Dae and a dozen protagonists that was obviously shot in one take but is so over the top , especially considering Dae has been stuck in a cell for 15 years all credibility vanishes after the first couple of blows
The big revelation at the end is to be fair in keeping the rather nauseating tone of the movie - Dae's nemesis is a former schoolmate who had sex with his own sister , got her pregnant and she committed suicide when Dae found out hence the reason for his imprisonment . Some people have complained about the schoolmate appearing 20 years younger than Dae but I suppose the years of solitary confinement have taken a physical toll on Dae . But there again Dae as I said can wipe the floor with a dozen thugs so has the confinement really been bad to him physically ? On top of that why let him out after 15 years ? Why leave him there for eternity or just kill him ?
For a film that has a high entry in the top 250 IMDb movies list OLDBOY is bitterly disappointing . Some people will claim because it's so different then it deserves its placing . The fact is there's nothing unique about it . The plot is something Jean Luc Goddard could have come up with decades ago and the graphic violence is an everyday occurrence on the torture porn sub genre . If someone wants something really challenging then just show me your girlfriend and a pair of swords and I'll give a proper challenge