After fifteen years of unexplained imprisonment, businessman Oh Dae-su is suddenly released without answers. What follows is a relentless pursuit of vengeance that is as psychologically intricate as it is viscerally shocking. Directed with formal precision and operatic intensity by Park Chan-wook (No Other Choice, The Handmaiden), Oldboy stands as the defining work of his Vengeance Trilogy and a landmark in 21st-century world cinema. Premiering to international acclaim at the 2004 Cannes Film Festival, where it was championed by jury president Quentin Tarantino, the film helped cement the global reputation of contemporary South Korean filmmaking.

Reviews

‘It’s a movie that you feel you’re not so much watching on screen as having beamed directly into your skull from some malign, alien planet of horror.’
★★★★★ Peter Bradshaw, The Guardian

‘Oldboy is a powerful film not because of what it depicts, but because of the depths of the human heart which it strips bare.’
★★★★★ Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times