Director: Park Chan-Wook (Oldboy, Lady Vengeance)
Writer: Wentworth Miller (Michael Scofield from Prison Break ha)
Cast: Mia Wasikowska (pronounced Vaas-Kaav-Ska), MatthewGoode, Nicole Kidman
Oldboy is on my
list of foreign movies I’d really like to see, and it’s beloved by much of the
film community that I read and respect so I was interested to see the director’s
English language debut. I walked into
the theater without having seen so much as a preview, so I had no idea what to
expect. As the film progressed I was
reminded more and more of how I felt watching Black Swan. Both are
beautifully shot and orchestrated well, but the tone is a sort of creepy
melancholy where the audience knows something is disturbed beneath the surface. Taking center stage is the Stoker family:
India (Mia), her mother Evelyn (Kidman), and a previously unheard from Uncle
Charlie (Goode). It’s clear from the outset
that India is highly introverted and off-putting in certain ways, and that she
has a strange relationship to her mother.
Brilliant acting from Wasikowska and Goode on display here, she is
totally convincing and heightens some already ruthless sequences with her cold,
ethereal presence. Meanwhile Goode is
all mysterious charm. (continues after the jump) |
| Whatever she's looking at, it's not pleasant |
I don’t want to go into the plot much, but something is not
right within the Stoker household and the story revolves around the revelation
of what that something is and how the characters respond to it. Despite all of these praises, the plot is
pretty shallow and it does take some time for the wheels to start turning. The unorthodox, peculiar way it was shot kept
my attention throughout it all, though.
The ending answers some questions but also asks a few more, and I think
Park Chan-Wook wants the audience to interpret things for themselves. The acting and cinematography are great, and
there are some harrowing moments in this unconventional coming of age story.
Grade: B+
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