20 Foreign Language Movies You Must See Before You Die
2. Oldboy
Country: South Korea.
Plot: A man who has been locked up in solitary confinement for fifteen years without any explanation embarks on a brutal odyssey of revenge again his captor.
There's a strong argument that South Korean cinema is the best national cinema in the world right now and it's arguable that Oldboy is its crowning achievement.
On every conceivable level, Oldboy is film perfection. A harrowing, nightmarish and ferociously powerful descent into the abyss that has one of the most demented, messed-up stories ever committed to film, Oldboy is a very dark and depressing film but it's also a highly rewarding one to watch.
Its layered themes and emotional depth are endlessly engrossing, it's startlingly beautiful in spite of the horrors it depicts and it's also, thanks to the exceptional acting, masterful direction and brilliant screenplay, an example of cinema itself at its finest.
This has become infamous for the violence, the eating of a live octopus and the ultra-dark twist ending, but that's not what it should be remembered for. It deserves to be looked back on as one of the richest, most hard-hitting and unique films of the 21st century that's destined to be remembered as a classic.