Obsessed with vengeance, a man sets out to find out why he was kidnapped and locked into solitary confinement for twenty years without reason.
Production Images
Trailer
Trivia
- Director Spike Lee said that his version of the film was 140 minutes long (mostly character build-ups and interactions), but the studio heavily edited it down to 105 minutes. This is why the movie opens with "A Spike Lee Film" instead of "A Spike Lee Joint." Josh Brolin preferred Lee's version.
- Josh Brolin personally created the title artwork.
- In an interview given on November 2014, Josh Brolin expressed his dissatisfaction with the final result of the movie, especially when compared with the powerful 2003 original version.
- The hallway fight scene was done in one take, but it was edited for the final cut.
- At one point, Joe looks at an octopus swimming in a tank at a restaurant and walks away, a nod to the infamous octopus scene from the original Oldboy (2003).
- When Joe Doucett goes to buy his daughter a birthday present, the girl working on the stall is wearing angel-wings. This is a nod to the original Oldboy film, where Oh Dae-Su buys the angel-wings for his daughter.
- Christian Bale, Colin Firth and Clive Owen were offered the role of Adrian, but they declined.
- Will Smith and Daniel Craig were offered the lead role but turned it down.
- Steven Spielberg was originally attached to direct with Will Smith starring.
- Cinqué Lee, Spike Lee's brother, played the Bellhop pictured on the wall in the prison room and appears as a hallucination. This may be an in-joke to the Jim Jarmusch film Mystery Train (1989), where he also played a Bellhop. Spike Lee and Jarmusch are good friends and are former film students at NYU; Jarmusch also directed Lee's siblings in Coffee and Cigarettes II (1989).
- The female lead was offered to Rooney Mara and Mia Wasikowska, but both declined.
- This was the penultimate film from FilmDistrict and the last film they released theatrically.
- Josh Brolin, Elizabeth Olsen, Samuel Jackson and Pom Klementieff have all appeared in various films in the the Marvel Cinematic Universe; each actor also starred in Avengers: Infinity War (2018).
- Elizabeth Olsen's character has an octopus tattoo on her right arm, another nod to the infamous octopus scene in the original.
- Lily Collins auditioned for the role of Marie.
- This film is a remake of the Korean movie Oldboy (2003).
- Justin Lin was attached to direct the film when the project was in early development.
- Samuel L. Jackson's character name is Chaney. Co-star Josh Brolin previously portrayed the antagonist Tom Chaney in the Coen Brothers' remake of the western True Grit (2010).
- Elizabeth Olsen did not know the ending of the film until she watched it for the first time at the New York premiere. "I've never been more shocked and surprised by an ending since maybe like The Sixth Sense (1999)," Olsen said. "No one spoiled it for me. No one hinted at it for me. And I got to experience it with just a blank canvas."
- This film marked Elizabeth Olsen's first on-screen sex scene.
- Near the end of the film, Joe receives a present: Chucky's tongue. This is a nod to the original movie wherein the main character cuts his own tongue off.
- Body Count: 42.
- The yellow umbrella that the girl (Haeng-Bok) carries features four five-bar gates, signifying the twenty years that Joe was imprisoned.
Movie Transcript
Project Videos
The Making of “Oldboy”
A longer Behind the Scenes look at "Oldboy"
“Oldboy” – Behind the Scenes
A short behind the scenes look at Oldboy.
“Oldboy” – Elizabeth’s Scenes – Clip 3
WARNING: THIS IS AN R-RATED (pretty strong R. I cut...
“Oldboy” – Elizabeth’s Scenes – Clip 2
WARNING: THIS IS AN R-RATED (pretty strong R. I cut...
“Oldboy” – Elizabeth’s Scenes – Clip 1
WARNING: THIS IS AN R-RATED (pretty strong R. I cut...
Release
The film was released on November 27, 2013. It was the last film to be distributed by FilmDistrict, before Focus Features absorbed the company in October 2013.
Premiere
Script developed by Never Enough Design / Edited by KaciElizabeth
