Oldboy

Chan-wook Park's Oldboy has been getting so much praise over the past two years that I thought it would be impossible for it to meet my expectations. Getting "Best Movie of the Year" awards by many movie fans worldwide seemed crazy back in 2003 when we had Lord of the Rings in competition but now that I've seen it, and it met my expectations, I agree on many of those comments, except Best Movie of the Year, as LotR was still the best that year for me. But since Oldboy is being released just now here in the United States, maybe it'll end up in top list of this year, because it is indeed an excellent movie, a marvelous masterpiece with some of the best storytelling I've ever seen.

It's all about revenge, as one night Dae-su Oh (played wonderfully by Min-sik Choi), after getting out of jail for being drunk, and out of nowhere, gets kidnapped and imprisoned in a room. His imprisoner gives him all the commodities like a bathroom, TV, food, a bed, whatever, except answers. He doesn't know who did it or why, so when he's released after 15 years (with money, a phone and new clothes), he must find answers to those questions knowing nothing at all. He soon learns that his wife was murdered, and that everyone thinks (thanks to his imprisoner) that he did it, and so he's been a fugitive of the law all this time. When he finally finds out who did it (or maybe his imprisoner reveals himself), he realizes he can't kill him without knowing the reason of his imprisonment, and as he learns more and more about his enemy, he realizes the real question is not why was he imprisoned, but why was he released after 15 years. Despite the story working with the use of hypnotism (which I don't believe at all but in this case accept it), and the ending is mind-blowingly awesome and like nothing I've seen before.

Oldboy keeps you knowing just what the character knows, and when you try to bet on what's happening or going to happen, you'll find yourself always being way off, and when you finally get to those final scenes, the result is something you wont believe someone had the balls to write. Intense and brutal, Korea's Oldboy was one of the best movies of 2003, and is one of the best movies of this year too.