1 post tagged “oldboy”

Oldboy (2003). After being locked away in a private prison for fifteen years, Oh Daesu seeks vengeance. There is a bacchanal of blood, gore, and sex.

Oldboy is a virulently purple melodrama, completely lacking in any breed of subtlety, and enamored with its own chop-shlocky violence and twisty, sordid plotline. It skimps on detail, oozes from genre to genre, and takes a Mike Tyson sized chomp out of feminism's ear*. Everything comes to a head near the last minutes of the movie where Daesu's impromptu skit as someone's "bitch" loses sight of its goals and the movie stops skirting the edge and completely devolves into a cheap and tawdry B-movie. However, all in all, Oldboy is deadly and effective, holding you by the collar and dragging you through a grim, seedy, and very visceral horror show.

*I'm still applying for my misogynist badge, but this movie even made me wince at some of the tin-eared, clammy dialogue that the female characters have to say.