[Oldboy] Cast, Plot, Meaning, and Why the Film Still Feels Like a Shock to the System
Some Korean movies travel because they are easy to love. Oldboy traveled for the opposite reason. It is brutal, stylish, unsettling, and impossible to shake off once it is over. Directed by Park Chan-wook and led by a ferocious performance from Choi Min-sik, the 2003 film follows a man released after fifteen years of unexplained imprisonment and turns that setup into something far stranger than a standard revenge thriller. The film won the Grand Prix at Cannes in 2004 and still sits at the center of conversations about how Korean cinema broke through internationally.