Oldboy

Oldboy won the prestigious Grand Prix at the 2003 Cannes film festival. It not only represents a definite breakthrough for Park Chan-wook but will remain one of the major cinematic works of the new millennium. This bloody, brutal, and brilliant gamechanger challenges the mind as well as the senses.

The second installment of Park’s revenge trilogy, Oldboy follows a quite ordinary man who is kidnapped and held captive in a dark cell for fifteen long years. While in captivity, word reaches him that his wife has been murdered – and that he is himself the main suspect. The man swears revenge, but he does not know who framed him or why. Oldboy is a work of remarkable visual innovation, with dark, majestic lighting and a soundtrack that blends waltz, tango, and techno.

Park Chan-wook (b. 1963) from South Korea is one of the world's foremost contemporary filmmakers. He has directed a number of visually spectacular and immersive films, and got his international breakthrough with JSA: Joint Security Area (2000) and Oldboy (for which he won the Grand Jury Price in Cannes in 2003). Thematically, many of his characters are motivated by revenge.