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Oldboy | 2013 | R | - 8.9.8

Remake of the 2003 Korean revenge thriller about a man (Josh Brolin) who was kidnapped and held captive in a motel room for twenty years. He is suddenly released and becomes obsessed with finding the identity of the person who had him kidnapped and seeking revenge. Also with Samuel L. Jackson, Elizabeth Olsen, Michael Imperioli, Sharlto Copley and Pom Klementieff. Directed by Spike Lee. [2:00]

SEX/NUDITY 8 - A woman with a towel around her helps a man remove his shirt and we see his bare chest; a portion of the woman's towel drops and we see her bare breast as the man and the woman kiss passionately, and then have sex: the man and the woman are seen switching positions multiple times with the man on top and then the woman on top and they are both fully nude (we see their bare buttocks, the man's bare chest and back and the woman's bare breasts in various positions; we later learn that the man and the woman were father and daughter, unbeknownst to them at the time, but later revealed to the man); another man secretly watches them on a CCTV and is aroused and delighted.
 A man grabs the face of a woman and kisses her and they pause and kiss again; we later learn that the man and the woman were father and daughter (unbeknownst to them at the time, but later revealed to the man). A man walks into a teen girl (his daughter's bedroom), the teen girl goes to unbutton her shirt in a suggestive manner, the man then goes into a room with a teen boy (his son) and the teen boy then unbuckles his pants in a suggestive manner.
 A man watches a workout video with a woman wearing a one-piece bathing suit while using a Thigh Master and making what could be interpreted as sexual sounds; the man places a pillow over his crotch and masturbates as he watches the woman (we see a tight shot of the woman's crotch and legs spreading; no nudity is visible); the man passes out while he is masturbating when the room fills with a chemical fog.
 We see a woman wearing brief-style underwear while a man is above her, he appears as though is he going to rape her; they are interrupted and we see the man leave as he smacks the woman on the backside before walking away and the woman pulls up her pants in a panic (please see the Violence/Gore category for more details). A man grabs a woman's upper thigh and makes a series of crude remarks asking her to have sex with him; the woman promptly turns him down and her husband overhears and is visibly upset with the other man (please see the Violence/Gore category for more details). We see a man's bare buttocks as he swims fully nude (his bare back and buttocks are visible); the man gets out of the water and wraps himself in a towel (we see a portion of his heavily scarred chest) as a woman wearing a thong and a sheer nightgown kisses his chest (we see her bare buttocks and cleavage). A man lightly kisses his wife on the cheek.
 A man has a flashback to when he was a teen boy and watched a teen girl having sex with an older man; the girl locks eyes with the man (as a teen boy), then leans her head back while having thrusting sex (no nudity is visible) and we later see the man realize that the teen girl having sex with the older man was actually having sex with her father. We learn that a man and a woman that have been shown having sex are father and daughter and that neither were aware of their relationship when they engaged in sex, but the man is disgusted and horrified when it is revealed and he is forced to watch clips of CCTV footage of him having sex with his own adult daughter.
 A teen boy grabs a pair of brief-style underwear from a teen girl's laundry basket, tossing them to another teen boy, who smells them deeply and makes a sexual remark about the girl; a second teen girl comes to the first girl's defense and tells the teen boys to stop teasing her. A teen boy teases a teen girl, calling her a crude sexual name; other teens then taunt the girl, calling her the same name repeatedly.
 A man tells another man that as children and teens that he and his sister had happily engaged in a sexual relationship with their own father. A man tells another man that he gains pleasure from forcing him into a sexual relationship with his own adult daughter (the man did not know the woman was his daughter when they had sex), so he could feel the sexual connection that the man had shared with his own father. A man tells another man that a school must have learned that a man was having sex with his teenage children, forcing them to leave the school and the country; the man implies that because the man was wealthy that no legal issue was made of the relationship. A woman reads a man a message that she had taken from another man: the message instructs the man to "stay away" from the other man's sister and the man listening to the message makes a crude gesture implying that the woman had large breasts. An older man makes a crude sexual remark to a man as a threat to the man's genitals.
 A man wakes up in a bed and he is shirtless; he stands up and we see his bare buttocks as he walks away and he pulls on boxer-style underwear, covering his bare buttocks. A man is seen shirtless nearly throughout the movie, we see his bare back and chest and he wears only boxer-style underwear. A man watches fitness videos of women wearing bikini tops. We see a portion of one fitness video of women wearing bikini tops and bottoms and we see a tight shot of the woman's backsides as they bend down (cleavage, bare abdomen, bare backs and part of their bare buttocks are seen). A woman lowers herself into a bathtub (no nudity is visible).

VIOLENCE/GORE 9 - A man walks into his teenage daughter's bedroom and as she goes to unbutton her shirt in a suggestive manner (please see the Sex/Nudity category for more details), the man shoots her in the chest with a shotgun (the force of the impact sends the girl backwards and we see a spray of blood hit the wall); the man leaves the room and shoots a woman in the torso (we see blood spray from behind the woman and a large, gory hole is shown in the woman's stomach); the man then walks into another room where his teenage son unbuckles his pants in a suggestive manner (please see the Sex/Nudity category for more details) and the man shoots the teen boy in the chest and shoulder (the impact blows the teen boy backward and blood and gore spray from the wound); the man cocks the gun again and shoots himself in the head (blood and gore spray from his head, almost half his skull is shot off and his dead body collapses on top of the teen boy).
 A man begs another man to kill him, the man refuses and the first man holds the gun under his own chin and shoots himself in the head as the other man watches (we see a spray of blood hit the wall behind the man along with small chunks of gore as it drips down the wall); the man's body is seen collapsed on the ground.
 We hear a squishing crunching noise, which we learn is a man fatally smashing another man in the face with a hammer; we see as the man smashes the hammer into a second man's face, a spray of blood leaves the man's head as his nose bridge caves in from the hammer, and the man walks over to a third man and cleaves the claw portion of the hammer into his head (we see the man's eyes bug out and blood pours from the wound as the man slumps over and blood pools under the man's head).
 Several men discover three dead bodies, and there's a lingering shot of the pool of blood under the head of the man whose head was cleaved by the hammer.
 A man is seen with yarn wrapped around his waist and legs, pinning him to a table and a metal knitting needle stuck through each hand and into the table (we see blood on the needles and from the hand wounds); another man stands over him holding a box cutter to the man's neck, where a series of dashes have been drawn with a permanent marker and the man tells the pinned down man that he is planning on cutting enough of the man's neck that he will be able to rip off the man's head with his bare hands; the man with the box cutter cuts into the man's neck, throwing the bloody pieces into a trash can and as he continues to cut, the man pauses and pours salt into the wounds, followed by water; the torturer is interrupted when another man knocks on the door and the torturer leads the man out of the room (blood is pouring from the man's wound-covered neck) and we see the torturer holding the box cutter to the man's neck as he walks through a crowd of other men.
 A man holding a box cutter fights off a group of 10+ and we see in slow-motion as the man kicks, punches and stabs his way through the men who all fall to the ground; the man runs into a second group of 10+ men and he punches, kicks and stabs his way through the second group of men, until he is stabbed in the back and he comes upon a third group of 10+ men in a cargo elevator who are covered in blood, lying in various positions in the elevator and one man with a sword through his chest is shoved to the ground by the man with the knife in his back; the man pulls the knife from his back and collapses to the ground as he crawls outside where a man and a woman pick him up and put him in a car, and then dump him outside a bar; we see the man recovering later as a doctor tells a woman that the man had been stabbed countless times and one of the wounds was centimeters from being fatal (a small amount of blood is seen on a bandage and bruising on his torso).
 A man holding a tire iron leaves an elevator and a woman and another man greet him; the woman grabs the tire iron from the man and uses it to smash the man in the stomach and he crumples over in pain before stabbing the woman with a box cutter and slitting her throat (the woman holds her hand to her throat as blood throbs from it, collapses to the ground and a pool of blood is seen around her body and she appears to die as the two men watch).
 A man chases a woman, he runs onto a football field and grabs the woman's arm, the woman shouts at the man and a nearby young man grabs the man and punches him; the man punches the young man to the ground and then fights the young man's five friends, including smashing one of the young men's heads against a bottle and straddling one of the young man and punching him with such impact that his neck whips backwards (a group of young women beg the man to stop); as the man walks away, we see the bodies of six young men lying on the ground and they all appear unconscious.
 A man pounds his head against a mirror and the mirror breaks and we see a small amount of blood on his forehead; the man then pounds his fists against a mirror, it breaks and the man takes a piece of the broken mirror and uses it to slit his wrists (we see blood pour from the wounds); he is then seen waking up in a bed with a bandage over his arm and his bloody forehead cleaned. A man bites his own hand so hard that he draws blood and uses the blood to create a smiley face on a pillow case, which he holds as he sleeps. We see a smear of blood on the bricks of a shower as a man digs at the grout around a brick. A man beats his head against a wall.
 A man tells another man that he will give the man a video of him killing the man's ex-wife and raping her (as he is saying this we see black and white clips of the man, 20 years younger, ripping the underwear off a woman and then choking her); the man begs the other man to stop and the other man explains that he will produce a signed confession for the murder of the man's wife, as well as the man's kidnapping, if he solves a riddle, but if he is unable to solve the riddle, he will murder the man's daughter; the man forces the other man to watch footage of a woman being tortured and a man is shown standing behind her (as if to rape her) while the woman is bound and gagged.
 A man rushes into a woman's house (we later learn that she is his adult daughter) where she is bound and gagged and a man stands behind her while another man watches and two other men stand in the corner; two of the men grab the man, bring him to a table and pin him down as one of the men looms over him, threatening him and saying that he had tortured a woman for 16 days straight after she harmed him; the man pulls out a straight razor and appears about to cut the other man, when he is interrupted by a phone call and the man gathers the other men and they leave the house (one of the men slaps the woman on the behind as they walk out); the woman begins to cry and shoves the man as he tries to comfort her. After a man comes onto a woman inappropriately (please see the Sex/Nudity category for more details), her husband overhears him and makes a terse threat to the man, then slaps him extremely hard in the face. A man with a knife stands up to attack another man as two other men with guns point them him; a woman grabs the knife from the man and kicks him in the stomach and torso, the man drops to the ground and we see two guns drawn and pointed at the knifeman. A man grabs another man by the neck, holds him and punches him three times, until he is distracted by a video and drops the man to the ground.
 A man opens a box and discovers a human tongue, and a woman looks in the box and cries out in horror. A man coaxes a mouse into captivity and we then see the mouse with ten baby mice; the man is extremely happy and tells the mouse never to leave; the man wakes up later and the mouse is missing causing him to panic and shout, a tray is slid under the door and he finds the mouse, dead and surrounded by its dead babies with a smear of blood on the plate; the man cries and appears inconsolable.
 A man discovers another man unconscious on the floor and he calls 911 but then hangs up; we see a woman giving the man an IV and tells the man that the unconscious man is exhausted, dehydrated and malnourished; the man wakes up with a start, grabs the woman and threatens to kill her, the woman talks the man down and he appears unharmed and unfazed.
 A man pounds his fists against a door and shouts angrily until a small slot opens from under the door; the man tries to pull his body through the slot when a foot stomps away the man's hands and head. A man grabs a hammer from the hands of a woman, and then shoves a young man off a bike and steals the bike, following a man driving an SUV. A man angrily shouts at another man and tries to grab the man but is calmed down when a woman appears. A man shouts angrily at a woman (his ex-wife) over the phone and the woman angrily screams back. A heavily intoxicated man shouts in the streets, asking for more liquor and we hear an unseen woman crudely shout back at the man to be quiet. An extremely intoxicated man pounds on the door of a restaurant until another man comes to the window and sends the man away.
 A man watches a television news reporter announce that a woman had been murdered and we see a sheet-covered gurney (a small amount of blood is seen on the sheet) wheeled away; the reporter announces that the woman had a daughter, and we see a small girl being handed to an older woman; the man becomes very upset when the reporter announces that the police believe that he had murdered the woman. We see a television reporter announce that a man, his wife and teenage daughter had been killed and a teen boy severely injured; a teen girl is wheeled out on a blood-covered gurney, and a blood-covered teen boy with a breathing mask on his face is seen being wheeled out of a house.
 A man watches a television program about the murder of his ex-wife and how he is wanted for committing the murder. A man and a woman read newspaper articles about a murder-suicide in a family. As a man writes a letter, we hear his voiceover read it to his daughter and he explains that he did not kill his ex-wife, his daughter's mother. Two men read a newspaper article about a man who had died in a car accident with his wife. We see a sign that reads, "Guns don't kill, people do."
 A man holds a box cutter in his hand and it appears that he was planning on using it, but walks away when he sees an older man suffering from dementia. A man's room fills with gas and the man awakens in a field, unharmed but completely disoriented. A man is shown heavily sedated by a gas as we see hands plucking hair from his head, taking a swab from the man's mouth and then placing the man's hand on a crow bar (we learn that these were planted as evidence in the murder of the man's ex-wife).
 A man watches footage of various disasters, including the following: the 9/11 disaster and he watches the World Trade Centers being struck by an airplane, and a man announcing that hurricane Katrina was moving toward New Orleans, as footage of flooding and mass destruction is shown.
 A woman with a bruised eye and a cut lip appears to have her hands bound over her head; we learn that the woman is a paid actress and see her wipe away the black eye and cut lip.
 We watch an extremely intoxicated man (please see the Substance Use category for more details) collapse on the sidewalk where he vomits all over his arm and hand and a pool of vomit collects under his head; we later see the intoxicated man stand up and no vomit is visible. A man takes a bite of food and runs out of the restaurant and vomits out the doorway (we hear the sound of vomit and see what appears to be a small amount of vomit leave his mouth). A man spits out his food, he then angrily throws a tray of food at a wall. A man eats a piece of food, then spits it out (visibly half-chewed) into a napkin. A man announces that he is going to urinate as we see him face the toilet, spit (we see spittle leaving his mouth and hear it hit water) and then begin to urinate (we hear the sound of urination). We see a man urinate on a building corner (the man faces away and we hear the sound of urination). A shirtless man (his bare back is visible) urinates in a toilet and the sound of urination is heard.

LANGUAGE 8 - About 32 F-words and its derivatives, 14 sexual references, 12 scatological terms (1 mild), 6 anatomical terms, 46 mild obscenities, name-calling (old man, big boy, fiend, freak), 2 religious profanities (GD), 7 religious exclamations (e.g. Jesus H. Christ, God, Oh My God, Jesus, Jesus Christ).

SUBSTANCE USE - A man offers to buy a woman an "eight ball" of drugs and the woman turns him down. A man drinks liquor nearly throughout the entire movie, a man drinks vodka straight from a bottle on many occasions, we see a teenage boy and an adult man drinking to the point of black-out drunkenness, a man is seen drinking to the point of extreme drunkenness and he vomits on himself as he collapses on a street corner (he is later seen standing back up and he is still heavily intoxicated), a man drinks at a bar and he offers a man a shot of liquor (the man turns it down), a man pours liquor into a soda cup and drinks from the cup unbeknownst to people around him that he is drinking liquor, men and women are seen drinking wine at dinner, a group of young men are seen drinking bottles of beer, a man is seen suffering from withdrawal symptoms on his own accord as he begins to pour out a bottle of vodka typically given to him on a daily basis (the man shakes and is seen obviously suffering), a man and a woman discuss how the man is an alcoholic, and a woman tells a man that she is an alcoholic and implies that she had also had a drug addiction. A man smokes a cigarette, we see a woman smoking a cigarette, a man smokes and chews on a cigar.

DISCUSSION TOPICS - Consequences, revenge, regret, alcoholism, guilt, incest, divorce, shame, reparations, finding peace, resolution, disappointment, murder-suicides.

MESSAGE - Revenge can drive people to extremes.

CAVEATS

Be aware that while we do our best to avoid spoilers it is impossible to disguise all details and some may reveal crucial plot elements.

We've gone through several editorial changes since we started covering films in 1992 and older reviews are not as complete & accurate as recent ones; we plan to revisit and correct older reviews as resources and time permits.

Our ratings and reviews are based on the theatrically-released versions of films; on video there are often Unrated, Special, Director's Cut or Extended versions, (usually accurately labelled but sometimes mislabeled) released that contain additional content, which we did not review.


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