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movie story oldboy 2003






The movie begins in medias res, with the silhouette of a person conserving onto a rope-like object -- a neck-tie, with the aid of which one guy is dangling some other off the edge of a building. The person maintaining the neck-tie is Oh Dae-su (Choi Min-sik), who commands the alternative guy to pay attention his story.


The movie then cuts backward to the 12 months 1988. Dae-su is a Korean businessman with a spouse and daughter. On his daughter's fourth birthday, he is picked up through police for being inebriated and disorderly. He harrasses numerous other people at the police station, showing them the angel's wings he bought for his daughter. Subsequently, he must be bailed out by using his antique friend, Joo-Hwan. At the same time as Joo-Hwan is in a telephone booth speaking with Dae-su's daughter, Yeun-Hee, and his wife, Kim Ja-Hyun, Dae-su is abducted by means of unidentified people.


Dae-su next appears in a private jail such as a shabby inn room. He has been saved there for 2 months without a phrase of who's retaining him there or why. He gets food via a small hatch at the lowest of the door, and is gassed into unconsciousness on every occasion he becomes suicidal, or whilst his holders want get entry to to the room (e.G. To preserve it; cut his hair). His best contact with the outdoor world is through the tv, from which he learns one day that his wife has been murdered, his daughter has been sent to foster mother and father and that he is himself the high suspect; his captors took blood and other items from him, and feature presumably left enough proof on the crime scene to implicate him as the offender. This, collectively together with his endured captivity, reasons Dae-su to slip into near-madness and violent hallucinations.


Trying to get a grip on his sanity and decide his captor, Dae-su fills several notebooks with an autobiography-prison diary, listing each person whom he ought to have likely wronged inside the beyond, but is not able to determine out who might hate him so profoundly as to imprison him like this. From year 5 on, he starts offevolved to tattoo strains in his arm for each year he is imprisoned, and forces himself to teach through shadowboxing, punching on the partitions of his prison till thick calluses shape on his knuckles. When one in every of his deliveries of fried dumplings seems to have an additional metal chopstick, he conceals it and makes use of it to slowly dig a hole into one of the walls. Over the following ten years, he works out, follows current activities on television, and loosens enough bricks to glimpse the outdoor world. He calculates that he'll need some other month to make the hollow large sufficient to break out.


That night, he's gassed again and a girl hypnotizes him. He wakes up to unfamiliar environment. Just as all of sudden as he become captured, Dae-su is ready loose on the rooftop of a constructing that has been constructed over the place where he went lacking. He has a new healthy of garments and his prison diaries. Adjusting to the intense afternoon mild, he sees another man sitting on the edge of the constructing with his small canine. The first person he has interacted with in fifteen years, Oh Dae-su is greatly surprised, unable to have a proper communique with him. We examine that the person is suicidal and says to Dae-su, "despite the fact that i'm no better than a beast, don't i've the proper to stay?". He then attempts to leap off the threshold, however Oh Dae-su grabs his neck tie, saving him from demise. Dae-su tells the man to delay his death, due to the fact he desires to inform him his tale, to which he utters "What?". The scene ends on the point in which the movie commenced.


After referring to his tale, Oh Dae-su walks off and out of the constructing, ignoring the despondent man's plea to pay attention to his story in flip. As he's leaving the the front entrance, the suicidal guy lands on a car at the back of Dae-su, killing himself and his pet. Dae-su pauses, observed with the aid of a extensive smile. "chuckle and the sector laughs with you. Weep and you weep on my own", he thinks to himself; an instantaneous quotation from the first line of Ella Wheeler Wilcox's well-known poem, Solitude. For the duration of the movie, Oh Dae-su uses this quote as a mantra for himself on every occasion he faces horrible conditions.


Wandering the streets of the metropolis, Dae-su does not recognize what to do with his new-found freedom because of his enemies framing him as the assassin of his wife. While a gang of thugs assault him, he unearths that his ten out of fifteen years of solitary education have paid off; he fends them off with best his fists. Subsequent, Dae-su stands on the road searching at fish swimming in an aquarium, when a homeless man walks up and gives him a pockets complete of cash and a cellphone. He then meets Mi-do (Kang Hye-jeong), a female who works in a sushi bar; he acknowledges her from a cooking display he frequently watched while imprisoned, and he or she says he appears acquainted too. An unknown guy contacts Dae-su via his cellphone, and claims to be the one who imprisoned him. He mentions it became an test, and taunts Dae-su to come back and discover him and examine the purpose for the imprisonment. He offers a mysterious clue: "a grain of sand and a rock each sink in water with the equal velocity". Dae-su asks Mi-do for some thing alive to consume, and gulps down a whole living squid, an awful lot to Mi-do's shock. Dae-su collapses with a high fever; Mi-do takes pity on him and takes him in.


At her rental, Dae-su reviews a second of weak point and tries to sexually attack Mi-do. She fends him off, however is familiar with he did it out of desperation. She tells him that she will be able to make love to him soon, and she will indicate while she is ready for it. Over the following few days, Mi-do does some inquiries and reveals out that Dae-su's daughter has been followed by means of a couple in Sweden. Dae-su comes to a decision now not to contact her yet and goes domestic with Mi-do, best to discover that she has been chatting on her pc for a while with a person, who eventually famous to be Dae-su's captor. Dae-su feels he can not believe Mi-do and leaves.


Primarily based at the taste of the dumplings that he ate for 15 years even as imprisoned, and having seen the call "Blue Dragon" on a receipt fragment as soon as, Dae-su goes to various chinese language restaurants with "Blue Dragon" in the call to be able to determine precisely which eating place it become. While he in the end finds the right one, called "Magic Blue Dragon", he follows the delivery boy on one in all his calls, and finds the jail. As soon as there, he finds and ties up the prison's manager, Mr Park, and tortures him by way of pulling out the man's enamel with a claw hammer (15, one for each year he become imprisoned). Mr Park factors him to tape recordings, one bearing his name. From the recording, Dae-su learns that the power is a non-public prison for those who need a person locked away. His captor had him booked for 15 years or even recommended what capsules to give him if he'd pass insane. The most effective purpose the captor would provide is: "Oh Dae-su talks an excessive amount of." Upon leaving, the prison guards gang up on Dae-su, however he fights them all off with nothing more than his clawhammer and his bare fists (although he does get stabbed within the returned). Gravely injured, Dae-su is positioned into a taxi with the aid of a man passing via. The man sends the taxi off to Mi-do's precise deal with, revealing he is Dae-su's captor, but Dae-su is not able to do anything about it in his weakened kingdom.


Back at home, Mi-do nurses him returned to fitness. Dae-su is going to see his old friend Joo-Hwan in his internet save, and performs the tape recording for him. Joo-Hwan doesn't recognize the voice, however succeeds in figuring out Mi-do's on line chat buddy, someone calling himself "Evergreen". They provoke a chat and Evergreen congratulates Dae-su because his wife's murder case has been disregarded, and taunts him some more. Dae-su returns domestic and attempts to violently force extra facts from Mi-do, nonetheless thinking she is working with Evergreen. All of sudden, Joo-Hwan calls, announcing that he has tracked down Evergreen's user identity and discovered the proprietor's information. The proprietor's call is 'Su Dae-oh' and there's additionally an address. Dae-su realizes it is an condominium in the constructing accross the street from Mi-do's appartment. He rushes off, investigates the condominium and finally meets his captor, a man called Woo-jin (Yu Ji-tae), and his bodyguard, Mr Han, in one of the rooms. Dae-su tries to attack, but is incapacitated through Han. Woo-jin tells Dae-su he cannot kill him, due to the fact if he does, he'll in no way learn why he changed into imprisoned, and if he tries to use torture, Woo-jin will remote-deactivate the pacemaker he had surgically positioned in his own chest. However Woo-jin gives to play a recreation with Dae-su: he have to discover why all this happened to him inside the subsequent 5 days. If he fails, Mi-do will die on July 5. If he succeeds, Woo-jin promises to kill himself. Whilst leaving, Woo-jin casually remarks that Dae-su left his front door open.


Dae-su races domestic and finds that Mr Park and his gang of thugs have captured and sexually abused Mi-do. Dae-su is roughed up, and Mr Park is ready to use the identical tooth-pulling torture trick on Dae-su, whilst Mr Han suggests up at the door and offers Mr Park a suitcase complete of cash, if he leaves. Park takes it and at the same time as leaving, Dae-su threatens to cut off Park's hand.


Dae-su and Mi-do leave the apartment. On the road, they grow closer together, and Mi-do shows she is ready to make love. After the love-making, they're gassed and Woo-jin leaves a bundle in their room. It consists of Mr Park's severed hand. Dae-su realizes that Woo-jin can pay attention each word he says, so he have to have bugged him. They go to a shop and have a cord removed from his shoe. The following day, with Mi-do's assist, Dae-su unearths out that 'Evergreen' refers to his antique high school, where he discovers Woo-jin became once a fellow pupil. He calls his pal Joo-Hwan, who confirms the locating, and mentions that Woo-jin's sister, who attended the school at the equal time and had a promiscuous reputation, killed herself later. However, due to the no longer being able to spy on Dae-su anymore, Woo-jin has gone to Joo-Hwan's internet shop, and enraged over the feedback made approximately his sister, he beats Joo-Hwan to death while having Dae-su concentrate over the phone.


Strongly suspecting that the reason for his imprisonment has something to do with the sister's demise, Dae-su tracks down Mr Park. Due to losing a hand to Woo-jin, he is cooperative now and consents to maintain Mi-do in Dae-su's old jail facility to keep her secure from Woo-jin. He also confirms that Dae-su turned into drugged and hypnotized numerous instances whilst imprisoned. Dae-su reveals every other classmate and discusses Woo-jin and his sister along with her. Seemingly, there were developing rumors about the sister's intercourse lifestyles and her in all likelihood being pregnant on the time. The rumors had been spread by using Joo-Hwan, but it appears Dae-su himself was the supply. Then he has a unexpected recollection of reminiscence. One day at school, because it turned out, Dae-su had unintentionally witnessed Woo-jin and his sister Soo-ah at the same time as accomplishing a sexual encounter. Now not knowing at the time that the 2 were associated and the scene he turned into witnessing changed into an instance of incest, Dae-su casually referred to what he had seen to considered one of his very own friends, simply earlier than moving to a college in Seoul. Finally, the rumor started out a life of its own and Soo-ah threw herself over a dam on July 5, killing herself. Dae-su in the end realizes the answer to the first clue: "a grain of sand and a rock each sink in water with the same pace", means that a informal observation and an outright accusation may both have the equal devastating outcomes to a person, so Woo-jin holds Dae-su responsible for his sister's death.


Dae-su ultimately reveals out in which Woo-jin lives, and confronts him with all of this facts. He accuses Woo-jin of making a search for a reminiscence that turned into erased using hypnosis; however Woo-jin claims no longer to have messed with Dae-su's reminiscence, Dae-su had without a doubt forgotten it himself due to the fact he thought it became insignificant. However, his litlle slip of the tongue grew out of percentage, to the point wherein it became rumored that Soo-ah had turn out to be pregnant. It became never clean whether this had in reality came about, but believing it and fearing public humiliation, she killed herself. Dae-su, but, implies that Woo-jin killed his own sister, frightened of fathering her toddler, and attempted to shift the blame to Dae-su to deal with the guilt. Woo-jin does indeed possess a photograph of Soo-ah on the dam, dated the day of her dying, July five. He took the photograph, so he turned into gift at her suicide. But Woo-jin then side-steps those allegations with a fair greater devastating revelation. He gives Dae-su a photograph album, the primary photograph of that's a circle of relatives portrait of himself, his spouse, and his daughter. The last pix inside the album are of his daughter growing older, till in horror Dae-su discovers that his daughter is none aside from Mi-do (on the equal time, Mi-do finds angel's wings in a bag, the same Dae-su had sold for her 4th birthday). By using carefully manipulating both in their lives - secretly looking after Mi-do from the age of three (possibly the reason for 15 years, 3+15=18) - Dae-su's when you consider that his incarceration and Mi-do's considering the fact that her father vanished - and hypnotizing each of them independently, Woo-jin turned into able to reason Dae-su and Mi-do to commit incest as properly. Dae-su goes right into a rage and fights with Mr Han. In spite of being mortally wounded, Mr Han continues him subdued, until Woo-jin shoots and kills him.


Dae-su then learns that Mr Park is still operating for Woo-jin, having been granted the possession of the jail in alternate for severing his hand. Mr Park is with Mi-do, and is ordered to present a similar album to her at Woo-jin's command. Dae-su is horrified, and begs Woo-jin not to let this manifest. He then gets on his hands and knees and begins to bark like a dog, in the end going up to now as to reduce off his own tongue so that he will in no way communicate an excessive amount of once more. Throughout this scene Woo-jin holds a handkerchief to his mouth, and it looks like he is crying, however then it suggests truly he's laughing with smugness and suffering to cover it so he can keep to watch Dae-su torture himself. Along with his thirst for vengeance that was his sole purpose for residing in the end spent, Woo-jin spares Mi-do from understanding and readies to kill himself and Dae-Su with the identical bullet. He adjustments his mind, however, and offers Dae-su the faraway switch to his personal pacemaker. Dae-su immediately grabs it and uses it, only to find that it would not kill Woo-jin, but turns on a tape recorder. Woo-jin exits the penthouse in an elevator, leaving Dae-Su by myself to be stricken by a tape recording of his incestuous love-making together with his very own daughter.


As Woo-jin leaves, we're taken back into his guilt-ridden reminiscence of his sister's dying. He's retaining Soo-ah over the dam, looking to store her from killing herself, and she says that she has continually recognised that Woo-jin turned into afraid, that she regrets nothing and asks him to allow cross of her. She appears at peace, and sooner or later he releases his grip. Lower back within the elevator, Woo-jin realizes that even after getting his revenge against Dae-Su, nothing will take his ache away. The digital camera is centered on his open hand, which slowly closes as if around a gun, cocks an imaginary hammer -- and fires the real gun into his head in the elevator.


In an epilogue set in a wintry panorama, Dae-su goes to a hypnotist (the same one whom Woo-jin employed to hypnotize both Dae-su and Mi-do) and asks for her assist to forget the name of the game. He writes her a letter, considering that he can not communicate. The hypnotist said that she in the beginning did now not need to help him, but she become touched through his final sentence: "even though i am no extra than a beast, do not I, too, have the right to live?". It is the same sentence Oh Dae-su heard from the suicidal man who appeared at the beginning of the movie.


The hypnotist tells Oh Dae-su to imagine himself back at Woo-jin's penthouse. She uses hypnosis to split Dae-su into personalities: the "Beast", who remembers the name of the game, and the "ignorant" Dae-su, who doesn't realize.


Whilst the hypnotist asks Dae-su to break up into the 2 people, a mirrored image of himself seems in the window. The hypnotist tells him that the monster will walk away and for each step he's taking, he will age a yr and die while he reaches 70. The mirrored image is the "Beast" - he holds a grim expression and remains unmoved, unwilling to go away his location in Dae-su's mind. The "ignorant" Dae-su, reflected within the glass, mourns the lack of a first-rate a part of his life. The digital camera cuts to the cassette player which then finishes gambling the tune that has set the scene. Oh Dae-su is needed the fine of luck, and the screen turns black.


Dae-su wakes up. The hypnotist has already long past, and he is left mendacity at the bloodless ground with a delirious feeling. He stumbles approximately, and subsequently with a few hesitation he meets up with Mi-do and that they embrace. The tender spoken Mi-do tells Dae-su that she loves him, and a huge smile seems on his face, which slowly disintegrates into a tortured grimace.




oldboy 2003 Trailer