20 Psychological Thrillers You Must See Before You Die

11. Oldboy

A man is imprisoned for 15 years by an unknown captor. He is then let out and given only five days to find him. That's the ingenious setup to Chan Woo-Park's disturbing Oldboy, a film best known for it's heinous twist, which I've previously written about on here (don't click if you don't already know what it is). And while the majority of the film's most famous scenes occur after our hero (Min-sik Choi's Dae-su Oh) is released - the octopus scene; the hammer fight - Oldboy is most interesting when we see the protagonist locked-up and, initially losing his mind but eventually teaching himself, via the TV he has been provided, to live within his means. Still though, it's the twist and its consequences that render this psychological thriller truly that, and the moral conundrums it raises are bound to leave you questioning them long after the film's masterful ending.