After being kidnapped and imprisoned for 15 years, Oh Dae-Su is released, only to find that he must find his captor in 5 days.

Possibly one of the best foreign films I have seen, watching it in Korean with subtitles is the only way to watch it. You get the sound of the "real" actors and not some fake American rehash poorly dubbed May I add.

I do not want to focus my time on complaining about the poor quality in the dubbing by American actors but sometimes they ruin the dialogue and butcher the story (Making it another film)

The film itself has a good story, dialogue and characters. The story might get confusing if you are not used to subtitles but trust me, it is a deep story. Not to spoil anything but when he finds out why they locked him up for 15 years you just would never see this coming.

I really enjoyed this film and would say give it a chance if you like foreign films.

Yeah, I bought it on DVD after hearing such good things about it. At first I was like... whoa, what's going on here, but the story was brilliantly handled. The twists were brilliant also. Very good film but not for the squeamish I'd say.

This is the second film by Park in series of revenge films. After seeing this film, I am very eager to view Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance and the upcoming third installment. Park shows his talent in this film as he shows us a beautifully choreographed corridor fight scene, with no cuts. The camera simply pans back and forth through the action and the fights scenes aren't those one guy takes on ten with high flying action, it's real, it's grounded and he still takes on ten guys.

Min-sik Choi gives one of the best performances I've seen in awhile and the bad guy, although not as dynamic as Choi, holds up well as well. The other supporting cast are able to portray real emotions and make the whole movie work and come all together in the performances. In the climax of the film, Choi gives not only a brilliant performance, but a weird one, that will have you either in tears of sorrow, or laughter. It's great seeing him try to adapt to the world, after being imprisoned for 15 years, like what he would do if he were to see a woman.

The film is violent, not in a killing way, because most of the deaths are taken place off-screen. The violence comes from torture scenes, you know, where a guy takes a hammer and takes out the guys teeth...ouch. There is a plot twist, and it is a big one. I was shocked and it stuck with me for ten or so minutes, the twist is controversial, which may put off a lot of American audiences, but I believe it makes the film what it is.

You feel sorrow for the main character, and even the bad guy, but can't really grasp this emotion until the climax of the film, a little late if you ask me, but the emotion that that scene brings out is in top form. It's a scene that goes down in history as disturbing, heart-wrenching, violent, suspenseful, funny, shocking...all in one.

So what can I say about this film, well, it's one to watch, maybe more then once, because it could be difficult for some to grasp at first, or even if you do, may be hard to actually "believe". Aside from that, this film is a treat for the eyes as one of the best revenge films to grace the screen.

9/10

I thought I'd mention that Oldboy was part of a trilogy but looks like I got beat to the punch. Anyway...

Oldboy is the best installment in the Vengeance trilogy and one of my favorite films of all time. It has the simplest premise of all three films but is executed in a sophisticated manner. It also has some great fight scenes, visuals, and a terrific sense of humor. Oh Dae-Su's one man battle against the thugs is especially remarkable. It is sloppy, brutal, and lacks any Matrix-esque stylized violence. It feels real overall, which is something I look for in films of this kind. I want to feel something when I watch a film, not something I'll forget about at the end of the day. Anyway, yeah, this one is fantastic.

Sympathy For Mr. Vengeance is a good film but it takes a while to sink in. I reviewed it immediately after watching it, which was a mistake. Like Requiem For A Dream and Irreversible, it took me a while to see the brilliance in the film. It is slow moving, extremely tragic, introverted, and takes patience to watch.

Sympathy For Lady Vengeance (or just Lady Vengeance), which I had the utmost privilige to see in theaters, in also excellent. It is the most visual of the three and also contains the most humor. It is a little confusing at first as it contains voice-overs from multiple characters but is easy to get into. It also has the darkest climax of the three. The film ends with light at the end of the tunnel (unlike Mr. Vengeance) but is still quite grim. It's also fun to see familiar faces from Oldboy and Mr. Vengeance pop up throughout. Almost all of them are here. Oh Dae-Su from Oldboy is actually the villain in this one with Woo-jin's sister (also from Oldboy) playing Lady Vengeance.

Anyway, all highly recommended. Chanwook Park is a genius and one of the top filmakers working universally today. That's my two cents.