Old Boy (2003) by Chan Wook Park

Old Boy is a 2-hour action thriller film centered around vengeance. It was released  in 2003 and won a Grand Prix at the Festival De Cannes, the first Korean film to have received this award.

Old Boy focuses on the vengeance of the main character, Dae-Soo Oh, who tries to get revenge on the villain, Woo-Jin Lee, who we learn at the start of the film had kidnapped Oh and held him in solitary confinement for 15 years. After 15 years, Oh is now homeless, whereas Lee became a successful man who is the president in his company that supports Oh to find him. During the film, Mido, a supporting character, helps Oh on his search for Lee by sharing a house, providing recovery from physical action, and assisting in research and mental healthcare. Gradually, Mido falls in love with Oh after he rescues her from Lee’s gang. When Oh finds Lee at the climax of the film, three quarters into the film, the real reason why Lee held Oh prisoner for 15 years was revealed: during high school, Oh spread a rumor about Lee and his older sister falling in love, and that led to Lee’s older sister’s death by suicide, and that Mido, whom Oh had fallen in love with, is Oh’s long-lost daughter.

In this climax of the film, which shows the plot twist, Lee explains his plans while getting dressed. Lee’s dialogue shows the hidden riddle of the film, in which he mentions why he set Oh free after 15 years, not confined him for 15 years. This dialogue shows the person who is trying to get revenge is Lee, not Oh, which flips the entire film’s focus on Oh’s vengeance to Lee’s instead. Lee reveals Mido is Oh’s long-lost daughter by pointing to the purple present box that he tells Oh to open, which contains a photo book of pictures of Oh’s long-lost daughter. In this part, where Oh turns the photo book pages, the music rises and becomes more dramatic, as the photos of his daughter evolve through the years and finally become Mido. The music escalates the tension in the scene, adds to the sense of rising panic, of the terrible plot twist. Also, in the first dialogue in the climax, Lee speaks a Chungcheong-do dialect. This also provides a clue that Lee’s vengeance started from high school, because he spoke dialect until he was in high school and never uses dialect again until he reveals the truth to Oh. With the switch in dialect, this is where Lee shows his true colors and intentions. It adds to the uncomfortable, mysterious atmosphere due to its contrast with Lee’s fancy and urban appearance while getting dressed.