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Oh Dae-su
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Oh Dae-su (Hangul: 오대수) is a fictional character and the protagonist of the 2003 South Korean film Oldboy, played by Choi Min-sik. Choi won a number of awards for his portrayal of Oh, including the 2004 Grand Bell Award and Asia Pacific Film Festival Award for Best Actor. He also trained for six weeks and lost twenty pounds to get in shape for the role, and did most of his own stunt work.Oh Dae-su is loosely based on the character Shinichi Gotō from the Japanese manga Old Boy, on which the film is also based. He has also been compared to Franz Kafka's Josef K, from The Trial, due to the nature of his oblivious imprisonment.
^ "Grand Bell Awards, South Korea (2004)". IMDb.com. Retrieved 2007-04-10.
^ "Asia-Pacific Film Festival (2004)". IMDb.com. Retrieved 2007-04-10.
^ The Best of Asian Cinema: Oldboy
Biography
Pre-imprisonmentDae-su was born around 1959 and attended the Catholic Sangnok High School, from which he graduated in 1978. Dae-su witnessed classmate Lee Soo-ah having sex with her brother Woo-jin, which later he inadvertently spread as a rumour. The rumor caused Soo-ah to kill herself. He then became a businessman in Seoul and married Kim Ja-Hyun. The couple had a daughter, Yeun-Hee, who was born around 1985.
Dae-su became an alcoholic and often fought with his wife and neighbours. At the beginning of the film, he is in a police station after being arrested for being drunk and disorderly. His friend, Joo-Hwan, comes to the station and bails him out. They then go to a nearby phone box and Dae-su calls his wife and daughter. As it is his daughter's third birthday, he had bought her a pair of wings as a present. As he hands the phone over to Joo-Hwan, he disappears into the night and the camera pans over the neon-lit, rain soaked city. He later described meeting a man, who presumably knocks him unconscious and bundles him into a vehicle. This takes place somewhere around 1988.
Imprisonment
Dae-su then awakes in a windowless cell, which is identical to a hotel room, a number of days later. It is a private jail, run by gangsters who imprison people for pay. He is kept in his room 24/7 and has no contact with the outside world; the only people he sees are the guards who come and put food through a hatch in the door. He is never told why he is there or how long he will be there and is fed only fried mandu. As he has only a television to keep him company, his mental health soon deteriorates and he begins hallucinating. He attempts suicide, but a gas which puts him into a state of unconsciousness is always pumped into the room before he can succeed.
Accepting that he will never be able to escape, in life or through death, he begins writing a list of people who he has wronged throughout his life and who could be responsible for his imprisonment. He also begins a workout routine and starts shadowboxing and punching an outline of a person on the wall. This appears to be his training regime so that he can take revenge on his jailer when and if he is released. He marks the years passed since his capture by tattooing himself.
While watching television, Dae-su discovers that his wife has been murdered and that he himself is the prime murder suspect. He then decides to escape, and begins tunneling through the wall using metal chopsticks. He eventually digs his way to the outside, but can only make a small hole in the wall before the gas comes flowing into his room. He then covers the hole by pushing his bed in front of it. This is his last memory before being hypnotised by a woman in his room.
Post-imprisonment
It has been fifteen years since his imprisonment began, and he has been given a new suit and his prison diaries upon his release. On the rooftop, he meets a man who is about to commit suicide by jumping. Dae-su saves him, however, and insists he listens to his story. When the man begins his own story, Dae-su walks off and takes an elevator down to the ground floor. In the elevator, he sees a woman for the first time in fifteen years. He steals her sunglasses and possibly also tries to rape her or masturbate in front of her. As he leaves the building, the woman calls a policeman over, but the jumper then falls onto a parked car which allows him to escape. As he walks into the centre of town, he comes across a street gang, who call him a "dick shit". He notes this as a new word, as the television did not teach him swear words, and then takes the gang on in a brawl. He did this to find out if "fifteen years of imaginary training could be put to use: it could." While standing outside a shop, a homeless man approaches him and hands him a wallet and a mobile phone, but explains that he has no information. Dae-su then enters a nearby restaurant and orders an octopus from a chef he had seen on TV, Mi-do, claiming that he needs to eat something live. He chats with Mi-do, then receives a call from his former captor and soon passes out.
Dae-su awakens in Mi-do's apartment, having been brought home by her. He attempts to have sex with her as she uses the bathroom, but is fought off. He starts to leave, thinking he has done something unforgivable, but Mi-do sympathizes with him, having read his journals. Both discover that his daughter has been sent to foster parents (the Von Ljungberg family of Stockholm, Sweden). Dae-su resolves to find his former captor and after many tries, locates the restaurant that provided the fried dumplings during his imprisonment, following the delivery boy to his former prison. Once inside, Dae-su ambushes the warden and tortures him for information, using a claw hammer to pull his teeth out. The info includes tape recordings of his captor, his only spoken motive being, "Oh, Dae-su talks too much". Dae-su then fights his way out of the prison past hordes of guards, suffering several serious wounds before escaping.
After Dae-su collapses in the street, a stranger places him in a taxi, only to direct him to Mi-do's address and identify Dae-su by name, showing his face briefly, which Dae-su knows but cannot place, before the taxi leaves. The next day, the man, named Lee Woo-jin, reveals himself as Dae-su's kidnapper and offers him the chance to play a game, where he must discover Woo-jin's motives behind Dae-su's kidnapping. Mi-do will die if he fails, but if he succeeds, Woo-jin will kill himself. Later, Dae-su discovers he and Woo-jin briefly attended the same high school. During the investigation, Dae-su and Mi-do grow closer together and eventually become lovers. Chasing his memories, Dae-su remembers spying on Woo-jin's incestuous relationship with his sister, Soo-ah and, unaware of their genetic relationship, inadvertently spread the rumor before transferring to another school in Seoul. Eventually, the rumor grew to include a pregnancy, which may or may not have been real, leading to Soo-ah's death, assumed to have been a suicide by jumping from a bridge.
Dae-su confronts Woo-jin with the information and accuses Woo-jin of killing his own sister to cover up the scandal. Woo-jin instead gives Dae-su a final gift, a photo album containing Dae-su's family portrait. As Dae-su flips through the album, he witnesses his daughter grow older in the pictures, discovering that she is actually Mi-do. Woo-jin reveals that Dae-su's kidnapping, incarceration, the murder of his wife and the upbringing of his daughter were all orchestrated to cause Dae-su and Mi-do to commit incest. It is also revealed that hypnosis and post-hypnotic suggestion were involved with Dae-Su's imprisonment, and had been performed on Mi-Do as well, and that the warden, thought to have betrayed Woo-jin to Dae-su, was actually still under his payroll.
Horrified, Dae-su begs Woo-jin to conceal the secret from Mi-do, groveling for forgiveness before cutting out his own tongue and offering it to Woo-jin as a symbol of his silence. Woo-jin agrees to spare Mi-do from the traumatic knowledge and leaves Dae-su in his penthouse with the words "My sister and I loved each other despite everything. Can you two do the same?" As Woo-jin rides alone in the elevator, he is struck by the vivid memory of his sister's death, a suicide in which he was complicit, and shoots himself in the head. In the epilogue, Dae-su sits in a winter landscape, where he makes a deal with the same woman who had hypnotized him while imprisoned, asking for her help to allow him to forget the secret. She reads his story from a handwritten letter and, touched by his words, begins the hypnosis process, lulling him into unconsciousness. After an undisclosed period of time, Dae-su wakes up, the hypnotist gone, and stumbles about before finally meeting with Mi-do. They embrace, and Mi-do tells Dae-su that she loves him. As they hug, his broad smile slowly disappears into an odd expression, neither happy nor unhappy, bringing into question whether the hypnosis worked.
Played by the actors
Filmography of Oh Dae-su (4 films)
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Oldboy (2013)
, 1h44Directed by Spike Lee
Origin USA
Genres Drama, Thriller, Action, Crime
Themes Films about families, Films about sexuality
Actors Josh Brolin, Elizabeth Olsen, Sharlto Copley, Samuel L. Jackson, Richard Portnow, Michael Imperioli
Rating58%
In 1993, Joe Doucett (Josh Brolin) is an alcoholic advertising executive for his company. His constant drinking has gotten him into frequent trouble at work, and one day his ex-wife Donna berates him for missing his daughter, Mia's 3rd birthday, which he brushes off. Later that night, he ruins a meeting with a highly potential client, Daniel Newcombe (Lance Reddick), by hitting on his girlfriend. Knowing that he will likely be fired for his failure, Joe gets drunk, and goes to a bar owned by his friend Chucky (Michael Imperioli), who refuses him entry. While stuck outside, he spots a woman with a yellow umbrella, before passing out.
Zinda (2006)
, 1h56Directed by Sanjay Gupta
Origin Inde
Genres Thriller, Action
Themes Films about suicide
Actors Sanjay Dutt, John Abraham, Lara Dutta, Celina Jaitley, Mahesh Manjrekar, Rajendranath Zutshi
Rating48%
Software engineer Balajeet "Bala" Roy (Sanjay Dutt), is happily married to Nisha Roy (Celina Jaitly), with whom he is having a baby. Bala is suddenly captured by unseen assailants and imprisoned in a cell. He is kept in total isolation for 14 years without knowing who imprisoned him or why. While in captivity, he practices martial arts which he learns from watching T.V., with the intention of using it against the people who captured him. He is finally released, again without explanation, and sets out for revenge.
Crying Fist (2005)
, 2h14Directed by Ryoo Seung-wan
Origin Coree du sud
Genres Drama, Action
Themes Sports films, Martial arts films, Boxing films, Le boxe anglaise
Actors Choi Min-sik, Ryoo Seung-bum, Im Won-hee, Byun Hee-bong, Chun Ho-jin, Na Moon-hee
Rating71%
Jobless, besieged by creditors, and abandoned by his wife, the once silver medalist Tae-shik has sunk to street hustling, becoming a human punching bag. Meanwhile, young Sang-hwan's delinquent ways land him behind bars. Both men look to boxing to turn around lives gone astray, aiming for the amateur title, ultimately pitting them against each other, but more importantly, against themselves.
Oldboy (2003)
, 2hDirected by Park Chan-wook
Origin Coree du sud
Genres Drama, Thriller, Action, Crime
Themes Films about education, Films about children, Films about families, Films about sexuality, Films about suicide, Films about school violence
Actors Choi Min-sik, Kang Hye-jeong, Yu Ji-tae, Yoo Yeon-seok, Yun Jin-seo, Oh Dal-soo
Rating82%
In 1988, businessman Oh Dae-su (Choi Min-sik) is arrested for drunken behavior, missing his daughter's 4th birthday. After his friend, Joo-hwan (Ji Dae-han), picks him up from the police station, they go to a phone booth to call home to let Dae-su's family know of his whereabouts. While Joo-hwan is talking to Dae-su's wife on the phone, Dae-su is kidnapped. He wakes up in a solitary confinement in a hotel-like prison. Confined with no human contact or explanation for his kidnapping and frequently gassed with a possibly mind altering drug, Dae-su soon learns through news reports his wife has been murdered, and he is the prime suspect. Dae-su passes the time shadowboxing, planning revenge, and secretly attempting to tunnel out of his cell.