• Studio: Tartan
  • Release Date: Mar 25, 2005
Metascore

Generally favorable reviews - based on 31 Critics What's this?

User Score

Universal acclaim- based on 201 Ratings

  • Starring: Hye-jeong Kang, Ji-tae Yu, Min-sik Choi
  • Summary: Oh Dae-su (Choi Min-sik) is an ordinary Seoul businessman with a wife and little daughter who, after a drunken night on the town, is locked up in a strange, private "prison." No one will tell him why he's there or who his jailer is. The imprisonment last for 15 years until one day when Dae-su finds himself unexpectedly deposited on a grass-covered high-rise roof, determined to discover the mysterious enemy who had him locked up. (Tartan Films) Expand
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 25 out of 31
  2. Negative: 1 out of 31
  1. 100
    Oldboy is a powerful film not because of what it depicts, but because of the depths of the human heart which it strips bare.
  2. 80
    This is absolutely not a film for all tastes, but it's a masterpiece of pitiless power whose audacious, ambiguous climax strikes a note of insane romanticism as haunting as it is perverse.
  3. 60
    Oldboy has the fatal air of wanting so desperately to be a cult movie that it forgets to present itself as a coherent one.
  4. 10
    Put simply, in my humble opinion, Oldboy sucks.

See all 31 Critic Reviews

Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 83 out of 91
  2. Negative: 6 out of 91
  1. Masterpiece. Critics who gave this movie negative reviews probably didn't understand it or it's simply not their taste. The violence may also be a bit too raw for some. But if you're a true movie fan, within 1 hour into this movie you'll realize that you're watching a true work of cinema art. From the intriguing storyline, raw character portrayal and excellent direction to the explosive twist ending, filled with underlying messages and morals, this is one movie you will never forget. You might even learn a thing or two about revenge. Expand
  2. Chan Wook Park directs this violent revenge film with style. The fight sequences are the best because they
  3. Jon-Jon
    6
    The film kicks off brilliantly and at times is genuinely absorbing but, unfortunately, it fails tie up the story convincingly enough to make it a must see. The histrionics at the film's climax and the cringingly puerile motives at the story's core, spoil an otherwise enjoyable and stylish film. Expand
  4. This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. A highly overrated movie , it seems that people are taken by "visual candies" and cinematography that they loose focus on the plot and story.
    The movie opens high and intense and grabs you from the beginning , and you'd want to know why Dae-so was imprisoned , but when he gets out and as soon as he meets Mido the first thing that comes to your mind is that she's his daughter, although they try to push that idea away later after that , still that's the first logical explanation you got , so that ruins the big surprise in the end.

    Also the fight scenes were very strange... why all those (thugs , gangs , security personnel....whatever they are) why they didn't have guns and just shoot him ?!! why are they carrying baseball bats ? and why are they breaking them on walls?!!
    and if his prison room had security camera why they let Dae-so continue digging through the walls all that time? and why didn't he block the sleeping-gas tubes?

    And in the final scenes, Really all that was because of a "Rumor"?? 15 years in prison and make him **** his own daughter for a "Rumor"!!! and it wasn't a "Rumor" !! he said what he saw, what actually happened ...!

    Woo-Jin should've just kicked Dae-so's ass in school and that's it , end of conflict.
    I don't know how things happen in Korea but when the young school girl was pregnant or appeared pregnant no investigation was done by the parents or by school or anyone !!

    Dae-so gave good emotional acting moments towards the end , but cutting the tongue was just too much , he could've just killed Woo-Jin and got back to his daughter...

    And the Final scene made everything worse, after all what he knew , that Mido is his daughter and that he was hypnotized to love her for the revenge , even-then Dae-so still went back to hookup with Mido..!!

    The Story is everything in a Movie no matter what genre it is even if it's a psycho / horror or even sci-fi , the story should always make sense.
    Expand

See all 91 User Reviews

Trailers