6.Woo-jin Lee in Oldboy (2003)
With an absolutely chilling performance, Ji-tae Yu offers us a villainous factor that is nearly extinct in most villains a soul. Although he is truly vile,
Oldboys villain is one with a fractured past. He is a blend of both the macabre and the unfortunate, which is exemplified effectively through Yus acting. He mastered the tool of contradiction, such as calmly grinning while revealing his sinister scheme to Dae-su. On the other hand, he dries his eyes when alone. He wears this mask in order to shield his agony from plain sight. His broken soul thus exposes itself to the audience. What hits the viewer the most, though, is that despite his orchestrated efforts and vengeful aspirations, they all fade in the climax when he spares Mi-do from the skull-crushing truth. He feels. He shows compassion to his nemesis. Why would he? For the same reason that he mourns over his sisters suicide; a minimal part of him remains human. A significant detail, in addition, is Lees victory. He may blow his brains out in the elevator and fundamentally lose, but all in all, he actually beat the hero of the story. He stamped him to a level rarely precedent in orthodox storytelling, yet that left him as unfulfilled as ever. His sisters death still flashed through his eyes even after obtaining the revenge he sought after for years.
Oldboy is one of the few cinematic examples of a lose-lose situation for both the hero and the villain, and effectively also one in which the viewer ends feeling sorry for both.