Oldboy (2003), Oldboy (2013)
Oldboy (2003) is a South-Korean film directed by Park Chan-wook. Oldboy follows the main themes of the mystery thriller genre and it’s main plot follows Oh Dae-su who is held hostage for 15 years with no clue of how he got there or who was keeping him captive. However when he is finally released there is no end to the torment for Oh Dae-su as he finds himself on a journey of vengeance to discover exactly who it was that had held him for all those years, and why. Oldboy (2003) won the Grand Prix award at the 2004 Cannes Film Festival with high praise from Quentin Tarantino and film critics alike.
Oldboy (2013) is an American remake of Park Chan-wook’s highly recieved work. This version was directed by Spike Lee and features many well known Hollywood stars like Josh Brolin and Elizabeth Olsen. This version follows much of the same plot with a few twists to make it feel more modern and fit the American market. However, despite Oldboy (2003) this new version did not receive any praise, only criticism that this remake did not add anything original to the film and ended up being one of Spike Lee’s worst performing films of his career.
There are many genres that many films fit themselves into in order to depict themselves to a certain audience, when we take apart these genres and find out exactly what codes and conventions each film in one particular genre have in common this is genre analysis. The Oldboy films are both a hybrid genre of thriller and mystery with themes of romance. I know this because the film depicts a lot of generic conventions from these particular genres. The generic conventions in this hybrid genre that correlate to the conventions of a thriller are that the plot of Oldboy is focused on a protagonist vs antagonist plot throughout the entirety of the films and this is generally the basic plot of any thriller film. We also see an increasing sense of urgency in Oh Dae-Su and Joe Doucett to find the antagonist who held them captive as well as a clear pursuit which, again, are signs of the generic conventions in thriller that we use to identify the genre of a film. Because hybrid genre’s take a few conventions from many genres there are other generic conventions of romance that we see throughout Oldboy. For example, the female is usually seen as ‘meek’ and only comes to life when a man is around to make her strong, this is shown in Oldboy as Mi-do is a very shy girl and lets Oh Dae-su take her around on his journey for vengeance without questioning it. In the Korean version of Oldboy, the antagonist’s side-kick is shown as a male character and is featured in a fight scene at the end of the movie. However, in the Hollywood version this side-kick is shown as a woman who appears to have sexual relations with Adrian, the antagonist, and always appears as wearing not very many clothes. I see this as Oldboy (2003) challenging conventions because it tries not to cater to the male-gaze so much whereas the 2013 Hollywood version replaces a male character with a female character only to sexualise and give her purpose when she is in a scene with another male character. Another way that these films challenge conventions is because the protagonist is not necessarily seen as the ‘hero’. Neither Oh Dae-Su or Joe Doucett are particularly likeable characters which challenges the way that the ‘hero’ is portrayed in thrillers as they are usually shown as males who have an established job, usually in the police field, and are usually seen as ‘misunderstood’ but ultimately likeable characters. I was surprised to find that I did not end up feeling sorry for Oh Dae-Su at all by the end of the 2003 film, which is definitely not typical, for me, in the genre. Another convention that these films challenged is that the romance turned out to be incest and the biggest part of the villain’s revenge, this is definitely not typical of the romance genre and even the thriller/romance hybrid genre so this is the height of convention challenging.
I think the target audience for Oldboy would be anyone who loves intense and confusing thrillers that leave you reeling for hours after watching it. Because of the violent and sexual content of the film I’d also say that the target audience is people who are over the age of 18 and love gore. This is because anyone who is younger than 18 may be shocked or frightened by the nature of the films, such as the scene that shows Oh Dae-Su removing somebody's teeth, and many not fully understand what is happening, especially due to the naivety and innocence of the younger audience. Categorising films can be seen as a negative thing because it allows for directors, producers and writers to conform to the generic conventions of the genre that the film identifies as, this then leads to more films of the genre using the same conventions and leads people to get bored of the genre as the films can feel exactly the same. For example, when the paranormal activity films came out and were so popular, the horror film genre became very repetitive and people started to get disinterested in the genre until more original horror films came out. However, despite this viewpoint, genres are also seen as a positive thing because the structure allows writers and directors to have a great deal of creativity when making a film, this means that they can reinvent the conventions that make a genre repetitive sparking an excitement with the audience. Examples of both of these elements in the films is that assigning the film to the genre means that the director feels they are limited in their making of the film in order to make a film that people want to see. This is shown in the typical way that the film is shot in terms of lighting and editing. Oldboy is mostly shot with very dim and dark lighting with a lot of close ups on Oh Dae-Su and Joe Doucett to portray emotion, which is not groundbreaking in the thriller genre as this is common in the editing techniques that are used throughout the genre. However, the genre also allowed Park Chan-wook to explore with different conventions as well as the writer who included a lot of symmetry between scenes that we see with Oh Dae-Su and scenes that we see with the antagonist which makes the film more exciting and intense to watch.
Psychoanalysis is a treatment used for Mental Illnesses that originated with Sigmund Freud. It investigates the interaction between the conscious and subconscious and works by bringing repressed fears and dreams to the conscious mind through various techniques. Psychoanalysis is often applied to films as a way of identifying the psychology of characters and themes shown throughout the films. I’m going to apply the psychoanalysis theory that Freud developed to both of the Oldboy films. The Id in psychoanalysis is usually associated with the villains in film, it particularly refers to the part of our unconscious that feels no remorse. In terms of psychoanalysis the Id is linked to animal instincts like sex, lust and aggression. Both of the antagonists in the two versions of Oldboy can be the Id because they both seem to act without any idea of morality or lawfulness. These characters are both shown as being sexually involved with family members, with the antagonist in the Korean version of Oldboy having a sexual relation with his sister, and Adrian in the Hollywood remake hinting at a sexual relationship with his father. These themes point at the sex and lust theory of the Id in psychoanalysis, and also the idea of not acting with the same morality that most people would. Another extreme personality type in psychoanalysis is the Superego. The Superego is usually depicted as the mentor character in films, much like Yoda or Dumbledore. This is the part of the psyche that dominates our ego as a moral conscience. There isn’t a straight-cut character in either versions of Oldboy that could automatically be pointed out as the typical version of the Superego but the women that Oh Dae-Su and Joe Doucett fall for could be seen as the Superego, because they help these characters along on their journey to find out who held them captive and also inspire the characters to do their own version of the right thing. The Ego in films is always the ‘hero’ of the film. This is the character who is neither moral nor amoral but has the Superego to lead them along their path to find a balanced morality between the two. I don’t think that is a clear cut character who represents the Ego in both versions of Oldboy however I do think that Oh Dae-Su and Joe Doucett are perfect representations of characters who can be both the Ego and the Id. These two characters start off as being people who aren’t nice and who always put themselves before their family and everyone else, they both have a long list of people who would want to do something like lock them away for 15 years but by the end of the film they both have had a transformation into someone who more resembles the Ego, someone who does bad things sometimes to achieve a good result in the end. Both characters are equally complicated and very aptly represent someone who has started as the Id and ended up transitioning into the Ego.
The idea of repression in psychoanalysis is that people forget traumatic memories in their life as a coping mechanism, this is most common in abuse victims as many case studies show. This is relevant to film because it means that there is an aspect to the film that the audience might not see coming which always adds an intensity to the film. At the end of Oldboy (2003) we see Oh Dae-Su see a hypnotist in what appears to be an attempt at regression so he can forget sleeping with his daughter. Some people believe that this hypnosis doesn’t work but others think that it does and Oh Dae-Su can continue his life not remembering the torture that the antagonist put him through. Another notion of Freud’s is The Uncanny, this is described as the feeling of having seen something before. There are three parts to Freud’s idea of Uncanny which are: De Ja Vu, this is shown in the Hollywood remake of Oldboy through the use of the umbrella as an idea of when something bad will happen, as Joe sees the umbrella right before he is kidnapped for 15 years, The Double and The Automation which is the idea that the audience are unclear whether someone is real or not. This is also shown in the 2013 version of Oldboy when a man appears in Joe Doucett’s bed out of nowhere and the audience do not feel sure whether Joe is hallucinating or not. The Uncanny is an important part of film, especially of the thriller and horror genre, because it frightens the audience without obvious use of scare tactics and allows the audience to feel scared without suspecting that it is happening. There was a difference between the representation of psychoanalysis in the films, especially between how they were used because the cultures and times between the two are so different. The elements of psychoanalysis in the Hollywood version seemed to be catering to the American audience because that is who was being targeted, the elements would be used to shock but also not too hard to grasp actually happening whereas the Korean version was perhaps more creative in its techniques to scare the audience.
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