Episode 228
Oldboy (2003)
This week we discuss the perfect film for everyone with a "World's Greatest Dad" mug tucked away in a cabinet, "Oldboy."
The original from South Korea, not the US remake.
Released in 2003, "Oldboy" was directed by Park Chan-wook and stars Choi Min-sik, Yoo Ji-tae and Kang Hye-jung. Widely regarded as one of the greatest films of all time, and is considered a classic of modern South Korean Cinema. A masterpiece of revenge, the film tells the story of Oh Dae-su and his search for answers and justice following his imprisonment of 15 years in a mysterious private prison. We discuss what the film has to say about loss of community, the carceral system, and how capitalism creates a society that functions as a prison as surely as a cell door and barbed wire does.
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Transcript
Track 3: Hello, and welcome to Left of the Projector. I am your host,
Speaker:Track 3: Ward, back at it again with another film discussion from the left.
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Speaker:Track 3: of our weekly episodes that drop every Tuesday. Now, on to the show.
Speaker:Track 3: this week we take a bit of a turn from the christmas films to discuss old boy
Speaker:Track 3: the second movie in park chan wook's vengeance trilogy it was released in 2003
Speaker:Track 3: and while successful making 17 million on a budget of 3 million it has gained
Speaker:Track 3: a cult status since hopefully you watched this prior to listening because it's
Speaker:Track 3: a hell of a film one of my favorites and there will be spoilers.
Speaker:Track 3: This film is arguably one of the best revenge films if not the best Father Day films of all time.
Speaker:bill: Bill and Evan?
Speaker:bill: Jesus Christ. Oh my God. I couldn't help myself.
Speaker:Track 3: I couldn't help myself.
Speaker:bill: Oh my God. Jesus Christ. I watched that movie like an hour ago so you know.
Speaker:Track 3: I just finished it for like, I don't know, like the for.
Speaker:bill: The first time.
Speaker:Track 3: Poor Bill.
Speaker:bill: See, Ward has watched it before, so he's like, I just finished it, but he's watched it.
Speaker:bill: I just finished it for the first time. I have never watched this movie before.
Speaker:Evan: And for, for listeners, I would say like mild content warning ish. Yes. Right. No.
Speaker:bill: Yeah. So there's a content warning. Yeah.
Speaker:Track 3: Yeah. I'd say there's some content warnings involved with this. It's very, uh, I mean.
Speaker:bill: We'll put the content warning in the show notes. We will put content warning
Speaker:bill: in the show notes, specifically stuff that.
Speaker:Evan: And for, and generally speaking, like anytime you, for
Speaker:Evan: listeners who may or may not watch the movie before they
Speaker:Evan: listen i would highly recommend you if you haven't to watch the movie because
Speaker:Evan: i think there's some episodes where you can like watch this you can listen to
Speaker:Evan: a random like action movie with arnold schwarzenegger and who cares if you've
Speaker:Evan: seen it like whatever but i think in a case like this you want to see this aside
Speaker:Evan: from the fact that it's really good yeah.
Speaker:Track 3: It's incredible movie one of my favorites this is probably like my 20th time
Speaker:Track 3: watching it that i just finished.
Speaker:bill: Jesus christ i will never watch this movie again not that like it's just it's
Speaker:bill: not the kind of movie that like I would like seek out to watch again this is
Speaker:bill: the kind of movie I'm like I've watched it once I don't need to watch this again like I get it.
Speaker:Evan: This is like my third or fourth watch.
Speaker:Track 3: Completely fair.
Speaker:bill: Also, I have like a phobia about breaking teeth.
Speaker:bill: So before, before ever got to the real fucking shocker, just the teeth thing
Speaker:bill: alone, that had me squirming. Like that is the one.
Speaker:Track 3: Oh yeah.
Speaker:bill: The one thing of like body horror kind of stuff that will make me react viscerally.
Speaker:bill: Anything involving the teeth.
Speaker:Evan: I feel the same way actually.
Speaker:bill: It freaks me the fuck out.
Speaker:Evan: Teeth and like needles two faces are the two things that i can't like i can
Speaker:Evan: watch almost any kind of horror that happens but those two things for me also
Speaker:Evan: are just like feeling here really.
Speaker:bill: Get yeah they get me yeah oh.
Speaker:Track 3: It's either the great time.
Speaker:Evan: Well so bill i guess you kind of already gave your reaction and ward already
Speaker:Evan: said it's you know you've seen this many many times so One.
Speaker:Track 3: Of my favorites.
Speaker:Evan: Yeah, I have seen other Park Chan-wook's films, and I would recommend,
Speaker:Evan: you know, there's a number of really good ones.
Speaker:Evan: You know, I would say the whole, like, Vengeance trilogy is good.
Speaker:Evan: And there's actually a new film that I was actually just talking about before
Speaker:Evan: you joined, Bill, was No Other Choice, which is based on a novel called The Axe by Donald Westlake.
Speaker:Evan: It's already out in Korea, but it's going to come out in the United States very shortly.
Speaker:Evan: I think it would be a very worthwhile exploration. it's about well I don't want to say too much.
Speaker:Track 3: Yeah no I'm very excited for it as well because I don't actually know what the Korean version.
Speaker:Evan: Is about I know what the book's about.
Speaker:Track 3: Yeah we're probably going to end up covering it on here though,
Speaker:Track 3: Should we go through a, uh, like a plot synopsis overview?
Speaker:Evan: Yeah. Do you want to say, Ward, you've seen this?
Speaker:bill: Yeah, Ward, this is your...
Speaker:Track 3: I ain't got nothing pulled up, so I mean...
Speaker:bill: I don't think you need pulled up to go through the plot synopsis.
Speaker:Track 3: Yeah, I don't need anything. Yeah, no. We got, we follow Ode-su, uh, who is a drunkard,
Speaker:Track 3: you know, down on his luck, fucking misses daughter's birthday,
Speaker:Track 3: sitting in a police station because he's so fucking drunk, and then,
Speaker:Track 3: uh, whisked away to a private prison
Speaker:Track 3: in a styled in a motel room for the next 15 fucking years where he gets his
Speaker:Track 3: hair cut and goes fucking crazy because no one talks to him no one answers why
Speaker:Track 3: he's in prison for 15 years the music plays the gas comes he falls asleep shit happens to him he.
Speaker:Evan: Eats lots of dumplings.
Speaker:Track 3: He eats so many dumplings yeah some poor guy gets fucked out of a chopstick, um...
Speaker:Track 3: Then he built some inspiration that, like, Daesu is, like, going to escape,
Speaker:Track 3: and then they just let him go.
Speaker:bill: I love that. I love the fact that he is about to escape, and then they let him go.
Speaker:bill: And, like, it is never implied that that was, like, part of the torture,
Speaker:bill: that they knew he was about to escape.
Speaker:bill: It just seems pure happenstance, and it's so fucked up.
Speaker:Evan: See, I didn't see it that way. They clearly had a camera inside of the room, right?
Speaker:bill: I guess that's true.
Speaker:Evan: Yes they do have so i assume they knew he was really close to escaping and they're
Speaker:Evan: like let's fuck with him even more and let him go right now and it's also the
Speaker:Evan: way the way they let him go to also initially feels like it's a dream like you
Speaker:Evan: don't know that it's true but then it is but.
Speaker:bill: He also at the end um uh wu jin like acknowledges that like he did release him
Speaker:bill: on that day specifically like that was so like it.
Speaker:Track 3: Is i think it was like perfect yeah he's he's gonna be out in like a few months
Speaker:Track 3: he's but he's almost out it's fine all right just let him keep going,
Speaker:Track 3: That's how I always felt about it.
Speaker:Evan: They also could keep him more drugged to make sure he doesn't get too close to escaping too early.
Speaker:Evan: They have full control over him. They gas him, hypnotize him.
Speaker:Evan: They do all kinds of weird torture.
Speaker:Evan: He's also training inside by punching a silhouette of a person on a wall.
Speaker:Evan: Clearly breaks his wrist.
Speaker:Evan: He becomes a really fit fighter inside there. because what else he got to do?
Speaker:Track 3: He devotes himself to training to eventually hope to find whoever put him in there.
Speaker:Evan: And watched a lot of TV.
Speaker:Track 3: So much TV. Well, I mean, that's the only thing. That's the only thing he had.
Speaker:Track 3: There's no window, no one to tell him why he's there or besides to shove food
Speaker:Track 3: through a door and kick him in the face.
Speaker:Track 3: Like that was his human interaction. That was his church. That was his community. That was his lover.
Speaker:bill: Yeah, that was that whole... That whole sequence that he talks about with TV,
Speaker:bill: that is your partner, your lover, your child, your church.
Speaker:Track 3: That's the average American.
Speaker:bill: That was so, yeah.
Speaker:Track 3: Right now. That's the average American's lifestyle right now.
Speaker:bill: It was such a-
Speaker:Track 3: No i mean they got phone when he first goes in oh when he first goes in yeah i think yeah like.
Speaker:Evan: 89 88 and then he comes out in 2003 when they have like.
Speaker:Track 3: Flip phones i like how they got 9 11 in the uh like the new sequences you can't skip 9 11 but like at.
Speaker:bill: The same time no chiron for it either
Speaker:bill: like it gets in comparison to other
Speaker:bill: things it gets so much less attention
Speaker:bill: which i found very interesting because
Speaker:bill: of the way america has you know as
Speaker:bill: we all know like just inflated that into such a thing and the rest of the world
Speaker:bill: like outside of the countries that were invaded and bombed and millions of their
Speaker:bill: civilians murdered in response to it um other countries are like yeah this thing
Speaker:bill: happened over there and then they just move right on.
Speaker:Track 3: So it's funny you say that because i just so
Speaker:Track 3: i just finished watching old boy but right before that i
Speaker:Track 3: watched the josh brolin 2013 remake
Speaker:Track 3: of old boy right before because i said i was going to talk some shit about josh
Speaker:Track 3: brolin and i re-watched it and uh honestly josh roland tried his best they just
Speaker:Track 3: it was just a bad movie holy fuck it was a bad movie but they also have a like
Speaker:Track 3: tv news sequence in the american one where it also has 9-11.
Speaker:Track 3: But then it also comes back to George Bush doing the Mission Accomplished speech.
Speaker:Track 3: on the aircraft carrier and it's like oh yeah this is american one so it comes back to that makes.
Speaker:bill: More sense.
Speaker:Track 3: Versus like the south korean one it's 9-11 and then like oh shit south korea
Speaker:Track 3: won the world cup that's sick.
Speaker:bill: Yes yes that's what it was like it was literally was 9-11 no chyron no commentary
Speaker:bill: nothing world cup and like blaring yeah like everywhere it's like world cup
Speaker:bill: yeah it was like that is hilarious did.
Speaker:Evan: You also catch one of the notes they put in there too is the like the big imf loan.
Speaker:bill: Bailout yes south.
Speaker:Evan: Korea in what is it.
Speaker:bill: Like 1997.
Speaker:Evan: I think because i and i think that's important only because like the context
Speaker:Evan: of as americans most people don't really understand sort of the politics of
Speaker:Evan: south korea and sort of what control the west.
Speaker:bill: And the.
Speaker:Evan: Imf has over that country i mean it's basically like
Speaker:Evan: a version of israel in that part of the world in the sense that we control what
Speaker:Evan: they do who's their leader how they spend their money and all these things and
Speaker:Evan: that that implicates how the people in this society live like the people you're
Speaker:Evan: introduced to and how they survive.
Speaker:bill: Despite the fact that like i will probably not revisit this
Speaker:bill: particular film i love south
Speaker:bill: korean like sci-fi fantasy and
Speaker:bill: like horror and there's and but
Speaker:bill: like also like i actually really like sci-fi south
Speaker:bill: korea like dramas like like they're soaps like
Speaker:bill: my wife and i have watched multiple you know various like you know south korean
Speaker:bill: like soaps and dramas and you know like rom-com kind of things and there's a
Speaker:bill: stark difference between those genres is in that the sci-fi fantasy horror are
Speaker:bill: all politically charged and they,
Speaker:bill: always, always the directors of all of those things the writers of all those things, it
Speaker:bill: always so obviously aware and pushing
Speaker:bill: a message of the way the united states controls south korea in many ways and
Speaker:bill: how they present it and they don't like it and you know even in this there is
Speaker:bill: mention of like you know north korea and like an agile agilatory like notion
Speaker:bill: of like the two leaders meeting and it's like.
Speaker:Evan: Yeah that's like right after.
Speaker:bill: The imf thing and it's like oh that's they're making a point he's making a point
Speaker:bill: when he does that that's not subtle if you understand the history.
Speaker:Evan: Especially if you watch other films by uh bong jun ho like especially the especially
Speaker:Evan: specifically the host which takes place there and is literally caused by american
Speaker:Evan: malfeasance is in in conjunction with the korean you know governor and military so we have a big hand uh,
Speaker:Evan: in the south korean uh politics if
Speaker:Evan: you will which i think i mean again it doesn't necessarily
Speaker:Evan: impact like the rest of the film but i think it gives you context of what the
Speaker:Evan: country is like yes yeah and like the thing that like the number one thing i
Speaker:Evan: couldn't stop thinking about is we just recorded our episode on um what did
Speaker:Evan: we just do was it a muppets which will uh you'll have already come out at upon
Speaker:Evan: this thing yeah i know you know i'll get there i cannot.
Speaker:bill: I can't wait The parallels.
Speaker:Track 3: Between these two.
Speaker:Evan: Are incredible. You'll see.
Speaker:bill: Okay, Muppet cast the bald boy, go.
Speaker:bill: Well- No, you finish your thought first.
Speaker:Evan: Okay.
Speaker:bill: Finish your thought first.
Speaker:Evan: So we were talking about- No.
Speaker:Track 3: No, no, imagine Kermit punching the wall.
Speaker:Evan: Well, Kermit has to be the main character because he's always the main character.
Speaker:Evan: And monster would be the bad guy or the other guy, right?
Speaker:bill: I don't know. Do you mean animal?
Speaker:Evan: What did I say? They say monster. I'm not animal.
Speaker:bill: You said monster, yeah.
Speaker:Evan: Well, because there is that Tony Trap later where he has the person on the thing.
Speaker:Evan: Anyway, the point that I was going to make was we talked about in the Muppets
Speaker:Evan: episode, not about Muppets and that's not how it relates, but like how we've
Speaker:Evan: constantly in a lot of episodes talked about alienation and isolation of people.
Speaker:Evan: And I think to me, that is like one of the, probably the three major
Speaker:Evan: themes and things that i see when i watch this especially
Speaker:Evan: again is the alienation and the isolation
Speaker:Evan: literally of a man in a prison cell for 15
Speaker:Evan: years and when he comes out he basically says like he still feels like he's
Speaker:Evan: in a prison like he doesn't actually feel like he's been released like the world
Speaker:Evan: is still a prison and i even think you see that with like the the the female
Speaker:Evan: character who will get to you know, soon, um, Mido.
Speaker:Evan: And so I think that all of the characters are just suffering from loneliness and the alienation,
Speaker:Evan: I mean, I think this is just a symptom of, obviously, capitalism and hyper-capitalism
Speaker:Evan: in places like South Korea. It's not related to the Muppets in any other way.
Speaker:Track 3: I was hoping you had something way more that you could tie the Muppets into
Speaker:Track 3: this. That would have been fucking fantastic.
Speaker:bill: Alienation is it's it
Speaker:bill: really like i i know that like as marxist like
Speaker:bill: we talk about alienation but i honestly i don't think
Speaker:bill: that it is really stressed enough how foundational that is not just in the way
Speaker:bill: in which this system functions but how integral it is to make maintenance of
Speaker:bill: that functionality of that system,
Speaker:bill: how it is a requisite aspect of it in such a fundamental way.
Speaker:bill: And I don't really think that it, we talk so much, you know,
Speaker:bill: especially as people like do, we talk so much about like, oh,
Speaker:bill: capitalism and it's this and a lot of times, like, I really feel like we leave
Speaker:bill: behind, like, and don't focus enough on de-alienation and what that takes from
Speaker:bill: you, which is community.
Speaker:bill: And we don't talk about community enough, how these kinds of things are prevented
Speaker:bill: by maintenance of community.
Speaker:Track 3: No, absolutely. I mean, in this movie, like most of our main characters,
Speaker:Track 3: they're all alienated in some form.
Speaker:Track 3: But then we get a litany of some side characters, which is fine,
Speaker:Track 3: you know, because they're still tied in with their community.
Speaker:Track 3: Like we go, we see the hairdresser and it's like, oh, yeah, let me just make
Speaker:Track 3: some phone calls. No problem. Like she having a bad time.
Speaker:bill: In the entire his entire story and
Speaker:bill: yes he has been hypnotized but at the same time it is clear it is made clear
Speaker:bill: at the end when wujin says like you didn't actually like we didn't have to do
Speaker:bill: anything you just forgot like you just forgot and it's like she just made some
Speaker:bill: phone calls because she's still like connection to people like if this had happened
Speaker:bill: to her she'd have figured out,
Speaker:bill: who the guy who the who the villain was like 20 minutes
Speaker:bill: tops she's like i'm gonna make a phone phone calls this guy goes for fucking
Speaker:bill: how long months just like trying to figure out that it's somebody he literally
Speaker:bill: knew like this is it's it's like three degrees of separation too like it's not
Speaker:bill: even like that far away and.
Speaker:Track 3: It's funny because like it's basically like we have
Speaker:Track 3: we've shown him like creating the lists of like
Speaker:Track 3: everybody he's ever wronged and like wujun's name is
Speaker:Track 3: never shown it could be in that list but if it was it'd be shown and it just
Speaker:Track 3: goes to show like nah man you genuinely just forgot you were such a piece of
Speaker:Track 3: shit your whole life this one big thing that was massive to him and his family
Speaker:Track 3: was nothing to you you genuinely forgot you didn't need to be hypnotized for that one I mean.
Speaker:Evan: It chose to, like, even it took this, it took being in prison.
Speaker:Evan: He also doesn't make that list initially. It's not for, like, a while.
Speaker:bill: It took a long time.
Speaker:Evan: Like, years. I think it's like six years or something goes by before he is like,
Speaker:Evan: well, maybe I wasn't the nicest guy in, you know, my life.
Speaker:Evan: And the thing that's also crazy that we didn't even mention is while he's in
Speaker:Evan: prison or imprisoned, they take a cup of his with his fingerprints on it to
Speaker:Evan: frame him. So they murder his wife and then frame him for it.
Speaker:bill: And blood. They take blood from him, too, and spray it over the scene.
Speaker:Evan: And so he's disappeared, but then he's come back to kill his wife,
Speaker:Evan: and now he becomes wanted so that when he eventually does get released, he's also now wanted by.
Speaker:Evan: He can't reintegrate into society. But that also takes his own community,
Speaker:Evan: who he also doesn't, you know, take very seriously.
Speaker:Evan: I mean, several times, Lee Woo Jin talks about how he can't protect women,
Speaker:Evan: which I think we could also get to also, is this weird patriarchal sort of concept
Speaker:Evan: that you have to protect them.
Speaker:Evan: And it's not just about protecting your community, not just like women in particular.
Speaker:Evan: Not that you shouldn't protect the women in your life.
Speaker:bill: You heard it here first. I'm not even gonna make that joke. My only like,
Speaker:bill: issue with that like the whole like listen everything like that is we
Speaker:bill: and like the whole like women thing like we that is all
Speaker:bill: show no tell like other than him being a
Speaker:bill: drunk drunk dipshit in the beginning like we
Speaker:bill: don't see him being a bad
Speaker:bill: person like even the whole like what
Speaker:bill: causes all of this like that
Speaker:bill: is so like high school
Speaker:bill: and like wuchin is the fucking villain he he
Speaker:bill: fucked his sister like yeah he
Speaker:bill: fucked his sister and like the way this is presented it
Speaker:bill: is still laid out as if like like daisoo's like the bad guy here it's like no
Speaker:bill: you had sex with your sister okay like he started a rumor which seems foggy
Speaker:bill: at best like even that whole thing it is yeah why he passed.
Speaker:Track 3: He passed it off to his buddy who by the end of the movie is already dead.
Speaker:bill: Yeah yeah buddy's.
Speaker:Track 3: The one who spread it all around yeah.
Speaker:bill: He literally he said he said one thing to one person and it's like,
Speaker:bill: honestly i was kind of shocked i was like wait a minute this is
Speaker:bill: he this is fundamentally this character this is a classic case of watching bad
Speaker:bill: like bad people be like look what you made me do it's like yeah bro you're a
Speaker:bill: fault you're the bad guy so.
Speaker:Evan: I i don't disagree with your like the the villains you know revenge plot this
Speaker:Evan: entire time to get back um to get back Odei Su is pretty maniacal and insane.
Speaker:Evan: He's spent his entire life doing this.
Speaker:Evan: But, to look at it from his perspective and I think maybe- Love a petty king. Yeah, but,
Speaker:Evan: As someone who is not South Korean or Korean or, you know, has an insight deeply into the culture.
Speaker:Evan: But what I do understand is that, like, the idea of, like, honor and these kind
Speaker:Evan: of things, like, it seems like he broke, like, the sort of, however, they're kids.
Speaker:bill: I'm sorry.
Speaker:Track 3: I'm sorry. I'm with Bill. It is two shitty people.
Speaker:Track 3: Two shitty people. One shittier than the other, which we don't find out until later. i.
Speaker:bill: Don't think notions of familial.
Speaker:Track 3: Honor cover.
Speaker:bill: Incest i don't think they do okay.
Speaker:Track 3: Yeah no this is the the
Speaker:Track 3: revenge that each of the like the story for each of the like the main characters
Speaker:Track 3: is a one that is extremely personal like wu jin that is extremely personal to
Speaker:Track 3: him because he fucked his sister and was in love with his sister.
Speaker:Track 3: And so he's gonna seek absolute fucking revenge.
Speaker:Track 3: Because it was personal to him. And he's a piece of shit. But it's personal
Speaker:Track 3: to him. And then we get the counterpoint,
Speaker:Track 3: daisu oh daisu who's fucking we get led and follow around and witness as a fucking
Speaker:Track 3: man driven by revenge until we find out oh wujin is actually that guy.
Speaker:Evan: Do you see the two of their sort of their their
Speaker:Evan: paths i sort of noted that like wujin's plan is like revenge whereas for daisu
Speaker:Evan: it's like vengeance for like what has been wrong to him like he realizes he's
Speaker:Evan: a bad guy but he doesn't realize how bad of a thing could I have done to have this happened to me?
Speaker:Evan: Do you see a distinction with them or no?
Speaker:bill: Well, what I would say is, I wouldn't say revenge versus vengeance. This is revenge.
Speaker:Track 3: It's revenge squared.
Speaker:bill: Invalidated revenge versus justice. Payback.
Speaker:bill: He imprisoned him for 15 years for a thing,
Speaker:bill: he didn't actually do he
Speaker:bill: didn't do anything he said to
Speaker:bill: one of his friends what he saw and then
Speaker:bill: all left town fucking didn't
Speaker:bill: didn't didn't stick around and then like continue to like perpetuate these rumors
Speaker:bill: he fucking told his friend what he saw and then left and his friends spread
Speaker:bill: rumors which were not rumors fucking facts she fucked her brother he fucked his sister well.
Speaker:Track 3: Like the rumor part was that she got pregnant.
Speaker:bill: Yeah and then she started to believe the rumors it grew into that which yeah
Speaker:bill: it grew into that which is totally his his.
Speaker:Track 3: Excuse his rewriting to be able to enact all this revenge on day sue.
Speaker:bill: Hey guess what man um you're there wouldn't be a room about your sister being
Speaker:bill: pregnant if you hadn't been, wait, I'm fucking her.
Speaker:Track 3: Throwing that out there.
Speaker:bill: Buddy just throwing that out there probably wouldn't which also which.
Speaker:Evan: Also is close if not actually also rape yeah.
Speaker:bill: She clearly unclear but you know what i'll go it was not enthusiastic consent.
Speaker:Track 3: I mean she then she later says like in the flashback but granted it could be
Speaker:Track 3: his memory of like oh i didn't regret anything yeah.
Speaker:Evan: Yeah so that comes.
Speaker:Track 3: From so like yeah and so oh they're both shitty people you know what i mean
Speaker:Track 3: one's just worse than the other But we also.
Speaker:bill: But again, we don't actually see Daesu being a shitty person outside of one
Speaker:bill: scene of him being drunk in a fucking, like everything else, it's all told.
Speaker:Track 3: He misses daughter's birthday being drunk in that jail.
Speaker:Track 3: But also, we see him make that massive list and you don't come up with lists that long.
Speaker:bill: No, totally. You're 100% correct. But all I'm just saying is- We just don't
Speaker:bill: see it, yeah. I just thought it, it didn't have impact. like i thought it was
Speaker:bill: a failure of storytelling to have it be told and not shown.
Speaker:Track 3: At all like.
Speaker:bill: It really it detracted from it for me as a.
Speaker:Track 3: Viewer so for so for me i'll say in the
Speaker:Track 3: remake they have more of a build-up before he gets imprisoned and it shows like
Speaker:Track 3: he's much shittier person like a constant alcoholic like left uh left the family
Speaker:Track 3: uh misses his uh kid's birthday it's like hitting on clients' wives and shit like that.
Speaker:Track 3: Like, he's a much shittier person before it, but I was like,
Speaker:Track 3: honestly, it kind of detracts.
Speaker:Track 3: I like the whole mystery of the entry of like, oh, you just come in on a dude on his lowest.
Speaker:Track 3: You kind of just instantly understand, oh, this guy's not great.
Speaker:Track 3: And then boom, he's in jail and he's been there for two months.
Speaker:Track 3: Well, what the fuck? What's going on here?
Speaker:Evan: That's how I feel.
Speaker:Track 3: And by the time that mystery is like developing, boom, he's out. I love it.
Speaker:Track 3: I love the pacing of that storytelling.
Speaker:Evan: That's how I feel the same way, whereas I think that if you had seen more at
Speaker:Evan: the beginning of him being shitty, I think it sort of retracts the flow and,
Speaker:Evan: like, takes a little bit away from the imprisonment aspect.
Speaker:Evan: Granted, you see more reason why he should be there, but I think he has to come
Speaker:Evan: to those terms on his own.
Speaker:bill: I honestly, like, I'm not saying it should have been before that.
Speaker:bill: I actually really like the fact that it's like you start and then,
Speaker:bill: boom, he's in the prison. but like i think that like if like said flashbacks
Speaker:bill: or something like that like.
Speaker:Evan: Okay i think it would have.
Speaker:bill: Been but whatever i'm not remaking the movie that's not.
Speaker:Evan: The point of this.
Speaker:bill: Show that's not.
Speaker:Evan: The point here no no i mean it's a it's a critique of the you know of the film i it's it's a valid uh,
Speaker:Evan: a valid thing one of the one of the things that like
Speaker:Evan: since i don't know which maybe ward said it is
Speaker:Evan: about the the memory you get of
Speaker:Evan: like their romance like uh him and his
Speaker:Evan: sister is like sort of based on memories like
Speaker:Evan: the one thing that i also which a lot of korean films
Speaker:Evan: i've noticed like incorporate the idea of
Speaker:Evan: like memories and how you how they shape you
Speaker:Evan: i don't know if it's like cultural or just sort of a it's a good
Speaker:Evan: way to tap into like characters i thought that
Speaker:Evan: like the way they each remember their childhood is
Speaker:Evan: like completely different obviously one of them had a sister
Speaker:Evan: commit suicide slash murder ish you
Speaker:Evan: know like kind of both in a way like why was she
Speaker:Evan: hanging off like the whole thing i mean it was also a good symmetry with the
Speaker:Evan: uh very opening scene where he's about to tell his story and he has the guy
Speaker:Evan: hanging off the top i mean you don't know at the time what that's gonna sort
Speaker:Evan: of mean but then like why why does he need to have that person at the top of
Speaker:Evan: the roof other than just kind of feels like a really good that.
Speaker:bill: Was the one that was i thought that was it was all.
Speaker:Track 3: To set up the fake dog.
Speaker:bill: When he falls onto the car and it's it's beautiful and wonderful.
Speaker:bill: That was so striking to me that he sat there, told that man, his story.
Speaker:bill: And they walked the fuck away.
Speaker:Track 3: He's not a bad guy. Okay. We didn't see him being a bad guy. Okay. Okay.
Speaker:bill: That is a good point.
Speaker:Track 3: Okay, Bill.
Speaker:bill: That is an excellent, excellent point. And I should have made note of that.
Speaker:Track 3: And not only that, he stole that man's line at the end.
Speaker:bill: Yes, he did. I don't really think that's, I'm not going to, but yeah,
Speaker:bill: the fact that you're absolutely correct. You are 100% correct.
Speaker:bill: That really, that did go to show how little he valued other people.
Speaker:bill: You're 100% correct. that is the end result of complete alienation like you
Speaker:bill: just don't even see the humanity in other people and he did he just walked away
Speaker:bill: from that he was like it's more important that i tell you my story and then
Speaker:bill: he just walked the fuck away and he didn't even take the dog with him which i was really upset about.
Speaker:Track 3: Yeah that dog didn't.
Speaker:bill: Do anything why are you jumping off at the jaw that's fucked up.
Speaker:Track 3: Yeah but like it yeah no it's so beautiful and
Speaker:Track 3: just really sets up for like nah he's a bad guy but also
Speaker:Track 3: like it's so striking compared to like
Speaker:Track 3: how he emerges from the box and interacts with the guy it's
Speaker:Track 3: so animalistic and feral after 15 years
Speaker:Track 3: of isolation he's like so physical with the man
Speaker:Track 3: and then all up to just lead to cool you can listen to my story nah i'm out
Speaker:Track 3: i'm out like cool i got i got over my little moment that i had to have which
Speaker:Track 3: then he had again in the elevator with the woman um sunglasses um yeah but like,
Speaker:Track 3: yeah i love that scene and then the fake dog when the body falls it's i love the.
Speaker:bill: Fake dog so it's so
Speaker:bill: jarringly fake um but like
Speaker:bill: at the same time like it really and like
Speaker:bill: this movie speaks to
Speaker:bill: the failure of the carceral
Speaker:bill: system as we practice it to do anything
Speaker:bill: in terms of rehabilitation or you
Speaker:bill: know solve society's problems like this movie is a an abject lesson in this
Speaker:bill: is the the carceral system breaks people and fundamentally turns them into people
Speaker:bill: who are incapable of existing within.
Speaker:bill: Society what regardless of how flawed your society is like they cannot function
Speaker:bill: within it Like this entire movie,
Speaker:bill: you, I think it is a, I think it's a failure of viewership to watch this without
Speaker:bill: constantly in the back of your mind, remembering this man spent 15 years in isolation.
Speaker:bill: He is not saying not a single thing that he does is really in, in the end,
Speaker:bill: like can be laid at his feet because he has been completely and utterly destroyed mentally.
Speaker:bill: And this is something we do to people every day in our own, in our society.
Speaker:bill: And then let them like, listen, uh, here's a bus fare and, uh,
Speaker:bill: whatever you came in with and, uh, Hey, good luck.
Speaker:bill: Hope you don't, don't break any rules again.
Speaker:Evan: I mean, it's purely the idea that you don't actually rehabilitate them and you're
Speaker:Evan: just expecting them to just come back because the prison system is a business
Speaker:Evan: at the end of the day. Right.
Speaker:Evan: Like literally in this movie, it's run as a business.
Speaker:Evan: This guy owns this prison converted motel or whatever the hell it is,
Speaker:Evan: like the hideous carpet and wallpaper and shit. Like he's just running this,
Speaker:Evan: like it's a, you know, like it's a motel. but for imprisoning people.
Speaker:Track 3: Yeah it's like the private prison in the truest sense yeah.
Speaker:Evan: Sending you doctors who really aren't there to help you but essentially to kind of check a box to say,
Speaker:Evan: whatever feeding you horrible things not caring what happens to you inside i
Speaker:Evan: mean the worst part about this is he doesn't actually get to even talk to another
Speaker:Evan: person in most prisons at least you have i'm not not as a as a like a thing
Speaker:Evan: to say it's good but like you have interactions with other humans most of the time two.
Speaker:bill: Hot takes from evan tonight you don't have protect don't protect the women in
Speaker:bill: your life and prison not so bad not so bad.
Speaker:Evan: Yeah just another thing you get dumplings i mean what else you get dumplings i.
Speaker:bill: Don't think i could ever eat another dumpling in my life.
Speaker:Track 3: It's obviously free health care you try to kill yourself well bam that shit's fixed.
Speaker:Evan: The one line we didn't mention before that came up a number of times,
Speaker:Evan: I think Odeisu says it, I think that Woojin says it is, oh no,
Speaker:Evan: I'm not Woojin, Meeju says it is, the night is getting lonelier.
Speaker:Evan: And it goes back to that, I mean, we don't have to go back to the whole alienation
Speaker:Evan: thing, but it's like everyone is also lonely.
Speaker:Evan: Like he's lonely in his prison cell. People are also lonely outside of their
Speaker:Evan: prison cell. And even when they meet and they're together, they're still lonely
Speaker:Evan: because there's like nothing that they can actually do to satiate themselves
Speaker:Evan: because they're still isolated.
Speaker:Evan: I think we've already said that they have to have each other in the sense that
Speaker:Evan: there's two people, but they don't know.
Speaker:Track 3: Another line that's repeated is, uh, it's like a laugh in the world laughs with
Speaker:Track 3: you, weep and you weep alone.
Speaker:Track 3: And it's like just further hitting home the point that it's like all,
Speaker:Track 3: all these main characters that we're seeing are alienated.
Speaker:Track 3: these aren't people with community these aren't people with support systems
Speaker:Track 3: except for wu jin which all of his is paid for it's only because he's rich and
Speaker:Track 3: we come to find out that his whole life is based on revenge and once he's done
Speaker:Track 3: with revenge all he's left with is money and money can't buy you happiness and
Speaker:Track 3: so he fucking eats one yeah.
Speaker:Evan: He even understands the system i think that that line was on a painting inside
Speaker:Evan: of his room right and then it just like comes up several times and i think it's
Speaker:Evan: one of the last lines in the film maybe towards the end right i think they says at the end yeah.
Speaker:Track 3: It's pretty close to the end.
Speaker:Evan: Yeah that line is pretty like a dagger and like so we still haven't sort of
Speaker:Evan: given we should probably listen to this watch this movie know like the big spoiler
Speaker:Evan: but like the big this might give away some of it is the influence from park
Speaker:Evan: chan wook was the like was it's based on a manga yeah,
Speaker:Evan: which I didn't know until earlier today, like loosely based,
Speaker:Evan: but it's also based on like the Oedipus, the story of Oedipus.
Speaker:Evan: So, you know, like, I guess we'll get to the sort of, it's funny when we're
Speaker:Evan: talking with Joe at the end of that, after the Muppets episode,
Speaker:Evan: she's like, you're going to be on the ending of this movie for a while.
Speaker:Evan: And like, we're at minute 39 and we're at the ending and you could tell her
Speaker:Evan: afterwards that she was correct.
Speaker:Track 3: Oh, absolutely.
Speaker:Evan: But the thing I was going to get to was like, he based it on sort of the Oedipus.
Speaker:Evan: And so the big thing, the big reveal that's just, I think for anyone like Bill
Speaker:Evan: who watched it for the first time, it's...
Speaker:Evan: It's shocking. It was quite shocking. It turns out,
Speaker:Evan: you know, again, for anyone who hasn't noticed that Lee Wujin had hypnotized
Speaker:Evan: both Odee Soo and his daughter, who is Mido,
Speaker:Evan: to fall in love through all these complicated hypnosis and then to also have
Speaker:Evan: an incestual relationship as well.
Speaker:Evan: So it wasn't bad. Isn't bad enough. He did it to his own sister.
Speaker:Evan: He had to make his revenge was to make him have sex with his own daughter.
Speaker:bill: I did not guess that that was the case, but early on, right around the time
Speaker:bill: when, like, they were, like, right before they had sex, I did look up.
Speaker:bill: I was like, how old are these two actors?
Speaker:bill: And I was like, that's a 20-year age difference, which is super gross.
Speaker:Evan: But see, in, like, movies, it's gross, but it also could just be,
Speaker:Evan: like, there was a moment when I think he says at some point,
Speaker:Evan: like, you shouldn't, you know, fall for, like, older people.
Speaker:Evan: You know, like he's, he acknowledges the strangeness.
Speaker:bill: My prayer for you is that you don't, that you fall in love with a younger man or something like that.
Speaker:bill: When, when he goes to confront Ruzhin and she, you know, she's like, I'll pray for you.
Speaker:bill: What do you want me to pray for her? And he says, I'll pray for you.
Speaker:Evan: And the way, and also the big reveal that Li Wuzhin gives him is that his like
Speaker:Evan: fancy penthouse apartment with these weird retractable electronic closets for
Speaker:Evan: whatever reason, I guess. Money can't buy taste.
Speaker:bill: No, I cannot.
Speaker:Evan: And he has like this ribbon box like you also see him earlier in the movie like
Speaker:Evan: making this little photo album and he makes the photo album and he's snapping
Speaker:Evan: through he's like oh that's me and my daughter and he's snapping it through
Speaker:Evan: and like he sees her as an adult and it just fucking,
Speaker:Evan: destroys him just I mean as it,
Speaker:Evan: would describe most people i'd.
Speaker:Track 3: Imagine oh every every person.
Speaker:Evan: That's not a just you know it's just it is so fucked up it is like it's the reveal is just.
Speaker:Track 3: It's so fucked on so many levels because then you have desus begging to not
Speaker:Track 3: tell his daughter because it will destroy her and.
Speaker:bill: Then asking the hypnotist to take that memory from him.
Speaker:Track 3: Oh no no i'm not even there yet i'm not
Speaker:Track 3: even there yeah it's it's still fucked up before that bill
Speaker:Track 3: is oh god he goes and
Speaker:Track 3: cuts his own tongue out which wujin's like you know what i'll give
Speaker:Track 3: you something you you cut your tongue out the cause of
Speaker:Track 3: all of this your fucking tongue and at least
Speaker:Track 3: in wujin's eyes really it's desu's friend who
Speaker:Track 3: can't fucking keep his mouth shut um but wujin
Speaker:Track 3: sees like you cut your tongue out the source of all of this i'll give
Speaker:Track 3: you something won't tell me though all right but i'll
Speaker:Track 3: drop my fucking device that i told you earlier that will stop my heart if you
Speaker:Track 3: press this button and I'll go ahead and leave and Dayzoo grabs that fucking
Speaker:Track 3: thing and hits the button and it doesn't kill him but it plays the fucking audio
Speaker:Track 3: sex tape in like Dolby 7.1 surround sound max volume,
Speaker:Track 3: of him and his daughter having sex like dude but oh she doesn't but wait wait.
Speaker:Evan: Does it plays the the movie for her.
Speaker:Track 3: No no no it's just for him in the penthouse oh he thinks he has the upper hand
Speaker:Track 3: finally he's like even though i cut out my own tongue i can kill him now oh.
Speaker:Evan: Okay okay yeah.
Speaker:Track 3: Oh now i'm stuck alone in this penthouse listening to it right.
Speaker:Evan: And then he tells the guy in the hotel where she's staying or the hotel prison
Speaker:Evan: like she doesn't have to open the box.
Speaker:Track 3: And then daisu decides It's what to do from there because Woojin ain't going
Speaker:Track 3: to tell nobody he's dead in the elevator.
Speaker:Track 3: It's on Daesu what to do forward. And he decides, I'm going to be a good dad
Speaker:Track 3: and go see the hypnotist.
Speaker:bill: So fucked up.
Speaker:Track 3: So fucked.
Speaker:Evan: Which he does what? What's the request of the hypnotist?
Speaker:bill: To cover his memories up again.
Speaker:Track 3: Yeah, cover up his memories.
Speaker:Evan: He doesn't want to know that she's his daughter.
Speaker:bill: Yeah.
Speaker:Track 3: Yeah, so that they can continue being together.
Speaker:Track 3: Which is something you can never get by the American audience.
Speaker:Track 3: If you haven't watched the remake, I'm going to spoil that too.
Speaker:Track 3: The ending's different. They didn't go with that at all.
Speaker:bill: I was going to ask. I'm like, there's no fucking way. I don't think.
Speaker:Track 3: He locks himself back in prison. He pays to put himself back in the private prison.
Speaker:Evan: In the American one?
Speaker:Track 3: In the American. Yeah, it's like dumb.
Speaker:Evan: Spike Lee, you fucked up on that one, buddy.
Speaker:Track 3: As crazy as this ending is that you have seen or heard about us just described
Speaker:Track 3: right now, it's still a way better ending than the American one.
Speaker:bill: It's really sad like that's the thing really is what that ending is it is.
Speaker:Track 3: Sad and sickeningly beautiful.
Speaker:bill: It is incredibly sad it
Speaker:bill: is so sad it is
Speaker:bill: just the culmination of the destruction of
Speaker:bill: a person's humanity and it's like the only
Speaker:bill: thing that he has really left
Speaker:bill: the only thing the only person he has left in the world is me do who is his
Speaker:bill: daughter but also she only has him and she doesn't know and it's like it's fucked
Speaker:bill: it's it's deeply fucked up it's.
Speaker:Track 3: So fucked in so many ways.
Speaker:bill: Yeah, I was shocked.
Speaker:Evan: Well, part of what the, so I was going to mention that like this,
Speaker:Evan: if for anyone who has never heard or knows like the Oedipus story,
Speaker:Evan: not only is it that the son has sex with the mother, it's that the mother kills
Speaker:Evan: herself and the father gouges out his eyes.
Speaker:Evan: like that's part of the like the ending of the
Speaker:Evan: story and you sort of have not a
Speaker:Evan: one-to-one comparison here is he cuts out his tongue earlier in
Speaker:Evan: the movie the other the sister commits suicide so like there's similar like
Speaker:Evan: tracks where he was he said as much like he was kind of like going off the story
Speaker:Evan: but like his interpretation of it and god it's it's it's funny like there's
Speaker:Evan: a hell of a right funny is the wrong word it's kind of insane not funny.
Speaker:Track 3: There's funny moments.
Speaker:Evan: Yeah well oh yeah I mean, we can talk about some of the other scenes,
Speaker:Evan: which I think are awesome that I, well, let me, let me go.
Speaker:Evan: I'm going to go back to what I was saying is the, there are so many scenes,
Speaker:Evan: this movie that were shot in one take, specifically the scene in the hall,
Speaker:Evan: in the, in the hallway when he fights all the people, that's one take, which is insane.
Speaker:Evan: And it's also the most fun sort of these guys with the, like they're holding
Speaker:Evan: what sticks and he's got, you know, a knife in his back still fighting.
Speaker:Evan: and you like at that moment you before you know what he's up against and everything
Speaker:Evan: that's going on you're like oh like this is he gets his revenge he like pulls
Speaker:Evan: the guy's teeth out and he gets some information and he leaves like okay he's
Speaker:Evan: gonna maybe make it that's just like the minimum of what's happened to him.
Speaker:bill: This movie is for going into this just knowing like reputation not knowing this
Speaker:bill: like not knowing the story not only the plot but like knowing reputation I was
Speaker:bill: expecting it to be way more violent, way more bloody. Like,
Speaker:bill: honestly if you don't have like
Speaker:bill: a thing about teeth the tooth scene is
Speaker:bill: kind of tame like honestly like objectively i could say like oh that's that's
Speaker:bill: kind of a taint like they cut away it's only the fact that my brain like can't
Speaker:bill: look away internally from that that really had any effect like overall the movie's
Speaker:bill: pretty i mean honestly in america i think it'd be probably except for the sexy pg-13,
Speaker:bill: straight up like.
Speaker:Evan: Well the incest might tip it over the edge yeah.
Speaker:bill: Other than that part but like you know other than that yeah i mean.
Speaker:Evan: Yeah i mean the only other really violent moments there
Speaker:Evan: aren't really other like that the tongue i mean there's
Speaker:Evan: a fight like there's no real torture after that like
Speaker:Evan: he's about to get tortured in the room and then he calls him and he's like no
Speaker:Evan: you can't do that like i'll pay you and he brings over like just a briefcase
Speaker:Evan: full of money like that's what's so crazy like he can't let anyone do anything
Speaker:Evan: to him because he is the only one that gets to inflict suffering and,
Speaker:Evan: upon desu which is twisted in its own way right yeah.
Speaker:Track 3: He's got like a whole game he wants to play man.
Speaker:Evan: What do you think he can't.
Speaker:Track 3: Have the game get ruined which again.
Speaker:Evan: What do you think he did to make all his money is it real estate i want to know.
Speaker:bill: That some it's got it's got to be.
Speaker:Evan: There's the only time you ever hear anything is when they arrive back to his
Speaker:Evan: apartment at one point and they go up he's talking on the phone about like some
Speaker:Evan: deal or something and you don't really there's no context to it about like a
Speaker:Evan: building or something so i just assume like real estate well.
Speaker:bill: He says he gave that guy mr park he gave him he bought him a building yeah.
Speaker:Evan: Yeah so.
Speaker:bill: I don't know.
Speaker:Track 3: I just assumed he's got stupid amounts of money so probably real estate.
Speaker:Evan: Yeah he like i like when he's when he shoots the uh his assistant and he gets
Speaker:Evan: like a little bit of blood on his shirt like a droplet he's like so pissed he's
Speaker:Evan: like oh my fucking shirt but there's blood on his face but like his face.
Speaker:bill: Is totally but yeah that's fine.
Speaker:Track 3: I mean are we supposed to take him as a coherent character he's pissed that
Speaker:Track 3: somebody's leaked that he fucked his sister yeah like and he has like a.
Speaker:bill: Fucking full-on shrine to her in.
Speaker:Track 3: His like and his right hand man is just totally also cool the fact that like he fucked his.
Speaker:Evan: Sister you pay him enough money he doesn't care right like you get the right
Speaker:Evan: person to he also was like much better at like fighting than he was like he had
Speaker:Evan: this guy who like you know he's like the final boss you know a guy who comes
Speaker:Evan: in and he has to fight him i also like how uh not like but wu jin like guts
Speaker:Evan: the friend in the internet cafe basically with like a with a cd like he breaks
Speaker:Evan: the cd and like guts him with it like that is a fucked up shit.
Speaker:Track 3: Well let's see he just gets so pissed hearing them talk about his sister he
Speaker:Track 3: fucking pops the cd out breaks it in half stabs him the fuck up with it.
Speaker:Evan: Was that an aol trial gnarly.
Speaker:Track 3: That's what I want to hope, because, like, fuck, I remember those.
Speaker:Evan: Who doesn't? Like, those are, like, coasters for every person because they're just everywhere.
Speaker:Track 3: It's so many. How, how, what percentage of the microplastics in our body are
Speaker:Track 3: because of AOL trial discs?
Speaker:Evan: 70 percent. Like, how many of those
Speaker:Evan: were actually used by a human being to redeem ours? Like, one person?
Speaker:Track 3: Two-thirds of that spoon that I have in my testicles worth, right? Yeah.
Speaker:Evan: I'm trying to think of, like, there's some other, like, notes that I put in
Speaker:Evan: that, um, well, the other thing, too, is he watches in on the TV Mido's,
Speaker:Evan: like, food competition where she becomes, like, a sushi chef.
Speaker:Evan: Do you think that they somehow purposely fed, ensured he would watch that channel,
Speaker:Evan: I assume, like, part of the hypnosis?
Speaker:Evan: Or is that just, like, luck on his part?
Speaker:Track 3: I mean, it's possible. I don't know, like, from the manga, the remake,
Speaker:Track 3: they purposely filmed TV shows just for him in prison.
Speaker:Evan: I mean, he also said that he'd been watching his daughter his whole life, right?
Speaker:Evan: Like, he'd been watching his daughter his whole life, so maybe he intentionally
Speaker:Evan: put her down the path to be a chef so that she would, I don't know.
Speaker:Evan: He seems to be very creepily involved in his life, right?
Speaker:Track 3: I mean, we can definitely assume that like he went out of his way to like change
Speaker:Track 3: all of like the official records about what happened to her because like she
Speaker:Track 3: goes looking for herself and finds out, oh, like,
Speaker:Track 3: oh, she's got Norwegian adopted parents or some shit. Here's the mailing address.
Speaker:bill: Yeah.
Speaker:Track 3: And then she gives it to fucking Desu and he's like, oh, I'll worry about that
Speaker:Track 3: later after I get my vengeance.
Speaker:Evan: Yeah it also the amount of research when
Speaker:Evan: he hears like the word evergreen he doesn't put it in into
Speaker:Evan: place that that like is the school he went to as a child i
Speaker:Evan: mean they don't say he went there the whole time right it seemed like he just
Speaker:Evan: went there for maybe a couple of years but like he doesn't remember like if
Speaker:Evan: someone mentioned to me my like high school mascot or something yes i would
Speaker:Evan: remember that be a pretty pretty obvious thing i mean you said it before uh
Speaker:Evan: war was like wujins like you just forgot you didn't like we didn't make you,
Speaker:Evan: not remembers like you're just a fucking arrogant sort of person who doesn't
Speaker:Evan: care about anything he doesn't care about his child doesn't care about anything.
Speaker:Track 3: I want to say like the ringtone is like the school's anthem i.
Speaker:Evan: Think it was.
Speaker:bill: Get out i did not pick up.
Speaker:Track 3: On that that's.
Speaker:Evan: That's pretty well that was that was like very clear like later when they showed
Speaker:Evan: them and that's that really cool shot where they're sort of it's half of each
Speaker:Evan: of their faces and he's talking about.
Speaker:Track 3: How he.
Speaker:Evan: Was able to sort of the call and the ringtone and made him fall asleep and the
Speaker:Evan: whole thing it's because they're very susceptible to um.
Speaker:Track 3: Yeah i mean every 15 years in prison every time that gas came on same song and
Speaker:Track 3: you didn't figure out it was your school song uh.
Speaker:bill: I don't know my school song from high school.
Speaker:Track 3: Yeah i don't either i yeah i don't know we even had one yeah i like how we're
Speaker:Track 3: all like how did you not know that and then we're all like actually you know
Speaker:Track 3: what maybe fair that's that might be fair.
Speaker:bill: Why would you know that.
Speaker:Track 3: Like the only reason you would be out of context in prison yeah.
Speaker:bill: Like the only reason you would know that is if like wujin you're fucking fixated on something like.
Speaker:Track 3: Yeah he only knows these.
Speaker:bill: Things like honestly like this entire thing like we're like it's like you just
Speaker:bill: forgot it's like yeah man because he didn't fuck his sister.
Speaker:Track 3: Like you heard it here folks left of the projector podcast says if you know
Speaker:Track 3: your high school's anthem by heart and by ear you're a sister fucking loser but like it's like yeah.
Speaker:bill: Like like so much of this so much of this movie and this character's movie, it's all projection.
Speaker:bill: It's all projection. Yeah, man, no, he didn't remember. Why would he?
Speaker:bill: He didn't fuck his sister, and then she didn't commit suicide because of that.
Speaker:bill: Like, no, he wouldn't remember these things because—,
Speaker:bill: His life doesn't revolve around the major mistake that he made because he didn't
Speaker:bill: fucking do that. You did.
Speaker:bill: And all of this is just projection on this, on Woojin's part. It's all projection.
Speaker:Track 3: It's all projection. Daysu's a pretty cool dude, you know?
Speaker:bill: I mean, he's not a cool dude.
Speaker:Track 3: We get introduced to him, actively talking shit to the cops.
Speaker:bill: That's true.
Speaker:Track 3: Trying to piss in their fucking police station, trying to fight them, actively talking shit.
Speaker:Track 3: Dude, I love the line when it's like, we don't want to see you again.
Speaker:Track 3: And he's like, just standing up straight as, as focused and like stern and like collected as he can be.
Speaker:Track 3: That's up to me. You fucking assholes. And then runs out.
Speaker:bill: I believe he gives him the finger too.
Speaker:Track 3: It's such a good line being told, oh, we don't want to ever see you again.
Speaker:Track 3: It's like, well, that's not fucking up to you.
Speaker:bill: I'm not saying D.C. was a good person. Okay. but i'm
Speaker:bill: just saying like like his wuxian's like
Speaker:bill: entire thing like it's all projection like yeah
Speaker:bill: he's really putting all of this on
Speaker:bill: day sue and like putting it
Speaker:bill: at his feet and like saying like this is
Speaker:bill: this is because of you i mean it's a
Speaker:bill: stretch but like you know we can look at
Speaker:bill: the way the ruling class does that constantly work it's like actually this is
Speaker:bill: this is because of you you're lazy you're lazy and you just had to work hard
Speaker:bill: enough to get where it's like all projection and it's like really you you're
Speaker:bill: lazy we're the ones doing all the fucking work like yeah.
Speaker:Track 3: We got the ruling class telling us we're fucking lazy we're pieces of shit but
Speaker:Track 3: we see we've seen what the recent epstein release what their fucking sex life looks like.
Speaker:bill: Yeah all.
Speaker:Track 3: Projection because they got fucked up sex lives.
Speaker:Evan: I mean you're right about the projection but i think what at least from other
Speaker:Evan: films of his that I've seen, and it seems like maybe it's a thing within
Speaker:Evan: South Korean films, or I think a lot in like Bong Joon-ho, you know,
Speaker:Evan: their films is there's no black, there's no like black and white,
Speaker:Evan: like this is the good guy. This is the bad guy.
Speaker:Evan: Like you see in American films, they create characters that are complex and
Speaker:Evan: maybe he didn't deserve to have himself in prison for 15 years,
Speaker:Evan: have his tongue cut off and be forced to have sex with his daughter.
Speaker:Evan: Like maybe that's a little bit of a stretch of what should have happened based on what he did.
Speaker:Evan: but he also isn't innocent and i think it's like making the characters be interesting
Speaker:Evan: instead of just this very much which it sounds like the american version of
Speaker:Evan: this was like josh brolin bad guy you know like you know good guy whatever i don't know exactly.
Speaker:Track 3: No it's like josh brolin bad guy but then like to reinforce that like the incestuous
Speaker:Track 3: guy is bad they go heavy hand heavier handed on the incestuous relationship.
Speaker:Evan: Okay where.
Speaker:Track 3: It's like oh he didn't see the brother and sister fucking he saw the dad and daughter fucking.
Speaker:Evan: Yeah and.
Speaker:Track 3: That's what caused the sister uh the dad um
Speaker:Track 3: like the that news getting out the dad took a gun and killed the whole fucking
Speaker:Track 3: family because he was fucking his wife and both the kids and like the son who
Speaker:Track 3: survived getting shot was like still in love and still wanted to like maintain
Speaker:Track 3: what his dad's incestuous relationship with the family was.
Speaker:Evan: I saw in the wikipedia it mentions it's so gross
Speaker:Evan: park chan wook's one of his influences
Speaker:Evan: is kafka and like the idea of like absurdity and surrealism and it makes a lot
Speaker:Evan: of sense actually like especially the final scene of the movie with like the
Speaker:Evan: snow and that whole thing there's lots of scenes too that are sometimes you
Speaker:Evan: feel like the movie is being shot like on a handheld camera and other Sometimes
Speaker:Evan: it's like very artfully crafted.
Speaker:Evan: I mean, the cinematography and the way that all of it is constructed is just
Speaker:Evan: incredible. I've really, really liked the...
Speaker:Evan: scene when they're confronting each other in the like the penthouse apartment
Speaker:Evan: and they're each looking in different mirrors but they're not like looking at
Speaker:Evan: each other they're just sort of this weird like reflection of each other and
Speaker:Evan: their actions but it's like not the same action i don't know you could probably
Speaker:Evan: interpret it different ways listen.
Speaker:bill: I'm not saying that this was a good person and that his.
Speaker:Evan: Character wasn't like i know multi-layered.
Speaker:bill: What i'm saying is that if someone was going to be punished in this way it should
Speaker:bill: have been the friends you want that's all he should have been in in you know
Speaker:bill: isolation for 15 years nah.
Speaker:Track 3: He was steady hanging out smoking cigarettes in a fucking.
Speaker:bill: Internet cafe.
Speaker:Track 3: This whole time.
Speaker:bill: The owner of that internet i really like i want to know why de su was the target because i mean i.
Speaker:Evan: Guess guessing his friend i mean because he probably i don't think it.
Speaker:Track 3: Doesn't even matter because it just goes to show how fucking petty and shitty
Speaker:Track 3: the evil guy the actual evil guy is yeah.
Speaker:Evan: Yeah i mean i was gonna say is he easily could have like tortured you know kids
Speaker:Evan: like you know as they're older later to uncover like who is the person who told
Speaker:Evan: the the first story right i mean given what all the things he's done i don't
Speaker:Evan: think it's beyond his uh there.
Speaker:bill: Are i do there are a lot of like i i felt like kind of like surreal and absurdist moments.
Speaker:bill: When he is talking to the hairdresser with the cap on as she is talking and
Speaker:bill: it like leads into that whole like flashback like the knees and stuff.
Speaker:bill: That was a real moment of surreality. Especially because it's like,
Speaker:bill: it's like he went there for like for info and he clearly got his hair done like
Speaker:bill: he's got the full cap on and just so out of place and yet she's filling him in but he looks so bored.
Speaker:Track 3: Yeah he looks.
Speaker:bill: So bored it's like god please stop talking i know i asked you but please shut up.
Speaker:Track 3: It's like fuck i shouldn't have asked i mean to be fair.
Speaker:Evan: He had been in prison for a long
Speaker:Evan: and like no longer had the ability to understand social cues perhaps yes.
Speaker:Track 3: I mean yeah even the first guy was like why do you talk like that and i guess
Speaker:Track 3: it's like he like even changed the way he talked just from sitting in there
Speaker:Track 3: and only listening to the tv no i'm not south korean so i can't pick up on the difference but yeah.
Speaker:Evan: I do wonder if any of the.
Speaker:Track 3: Language like.
Speaker:Evan: If if you spoke korean would the would like any of there be different meaning
Speaker:Evan: in some of the things that are going up.
Speaker:Track 3: Yeah i mean i feel like it would just be like if you were stuck
Speaker:Track 3: in a fucking private prison room with nothing
Speaker:Track 3: but like cable tv or local tv channels
Speaker:Track 3: for 15 years you're gonna basically pick
Speaker:Track 3: up a real news anchor non-regional
Speaker:Track 3: dialect because you watch that shit a lot a
Speaker:Track 3: whole lot and that's your only interaction true so that's why i'm kind of like
Speaker:Track 3: thinking that's had somewhat a similar effect or like even picked up um because
Speaker:Track 3: like we hear him repeating the um like medicine commercials and shit like that
Speaker:Track 3: and so like he might be doing it in like that super monotone matter of fact
Speaker:Track 3: i don't speak korean so i can't tell yeah.
Speaker:Evan: Yeah sam it's,
Speaker:Evan: can only go based on that i mean i'm guessing the translation is pretty good so.
Speaker:bill: Now i did not realize this was part of a trilogy um.
Speaker:Evan: What have you both there's no plot relation to any of the film.
Speaker:Track 3: Yeah it's simply thematic yeah okay.
Speaker:bill: So so it's purely thematic.
Speaker:Track 3: Vengeance is the theme okay all right yeah it's like um lady vengeance and sympathy
Speaker:Track 3: for mr vengeance are the other two movies right yeah i believe this is the.
Speaker:Evan: Second one of the three and it's usually considered to be the best of the.
Speaker:Track 3: It's definitely the best i.
Speaker:Evan: Mean especially the most.
Speaker:Track 3: I like the other two i look i like a
Speaker:Track 3: lot of south korean movies this was the second south korean movie i
Speaker:Track 3: ever watched and it's what really made me fall in love with uh south korean
Speaker:Track 3: movies um but i mean even to your point evan like you're saying like how uh
Speaker:Track 3: south korean movies they really like to lean into like not having clean cut
Speaker:Track 3: characters like this is a good guy this is a bad guy and stuff like that is one that,
Speaker:Track 3: a couple of that I remember was like The Chaser, where it's like it's a pimp
Speaker:Track 3: who's like trying to chase down a fucking,
Speaker:Track 3: serial killer, and then um, what is it?
Speaker:Track 3: The Gangster, the Cop, and the Devil, where like the gangster is like the actual
Speaker:Track 3: good guy that like took care like, that knows this like local girl,
Speaker:Track 3: and like who ends up getting killed by a fucking serial killer,
Speaker:Track 3: and like puts out all his fucking boys to go track this motherfucker down.
Speaker:Evan: Yeah.
Speaker:Track 3: It's definitely a recurring thing.
Speaker:Evan: I was trying to think of some other South Korean films I've seen that I would recommend.
Speaker:Evan: The ones I was, I mean, people probably know Bong Joon-ho's films first and
Speaker:Evan: foremost, but I would also recommend the, I can't think of the director, is The Wailing.
Speaker:Evan: I would highly recommend that movie if you haven't seen it.
Speaker:Track 3: Oh, very good movie.
Speaker:Evan: Memories of Murder, which is Bong Joon-ho also. Excellent movie.
Speaker:Track 3: Memoirs of a Murderer is also another good South Korean movie.
Speaker:Track 3: um some people accidentally watch it uh
Speaker:Track 3: when looking for memories of a murder crazy i didn't know
Speaker:Track 3: um yeah that and by some people i
Speaker:Track 3: mean me that's me i'm some people um i
Speaker:Track 3: watched that one first i was like this was fantastic no wonder people were
Speaker:Track 3: like speaking highly of this film and then i realized oh i
Speaker:Track 3: watched the wrong one and then i watched bong june ho's
Speaker:Track 3: film and i was like oh this is so fucking good but
Speaker:Track 3: also memoirs of a murder is a good movie i highly recommend um yeah i most i
Speaker:Track 3: got into south korean movies like through the mostly revenge films at first
Speaker:Track 3: and so like films like um yeah the chaser uh i saw the devil um the man from nowhere shit like that,
Speaker:Track 3: yeah um joint security area is another good thirst.
Speaker:Evan: Is another good one if you like vampire films.
Speaker:Track 3: Oh yeah so.
Speaker:Evan: Much to like a different sort of.
Speaker:Track 3: Train to busan train busan yeah i.
Speaker:bill: Love train to busan.
Speaker:Evan: Trying to think of if there's any others that i can think of you said i saw the devil or.
Speaker:Track 3: We We definitely need to check out No Other Choice once we get a chance,
Speaker:Track 3: and I think we're going to end up covering it.
Speaker:Evan: Yes, I need to see that movie. It's coming out. I had a chance to see it like
Speaker:Evan: an early release, but wasn't able to go.
Speaker:Evan: But I believe it's coming out in American theaters either very soon or is out.
Speaker:Track 3: It's that movie that I sent the meme where I was like, there's a South Korean
Speaker:Track 3: movie about the horrors of capitalism, and it's supposed to be nuts.
Speaker:Evan: Oh, it comes out on Christmas.
Speaker:Evan: Christmas movie with your family. Go see No Other Choice.
Speaker:Track 3: Dude, new Christmas movie.
Speaker:Evan: Man, I'm going to have to find a way to sneak off and see this. Maybe not on Christmas.
Speaker:bill: You don't? Do you celebrate Christmas?
Speaker:Evan: Well, no, but this year I will be.
Speaker:bill: You don't celebrate?
Speaker:Track 3: I'm going to sneak away on Christmas.
Speaker:Evan: It's not because it is Christmas, but because we still do stuff as family type
Speaker:Evan: of. And this year actually we'll be celebrating with cousins who do celebrate Christmas, so.
Speaker:bill: Okay.
Speaker:Evan: This year will be different.
Speaker:Evan: Yeah, I definitely need to see that. I don't know, just because it's going to be.
Speaker:Track 3: Thank you, Bill. You beat me to it, by the way. I was going to try to hammer that point, too.
Speaker:Track 3: Oh, that doesn't make sense.
Speaker:Track 3: Should be super easy to sneak away.
Speaker:Evan: Well, usually we do see like a movie.
Speaker:Track 3: Sneaking away from nothing.
Speaker:Evan: Usually on Christmas, my family sees like a movie and has dinner at a Chinese
Speaker:Evan: restaurant. But because we'll be with this other family, that's not their tradition.
Speaker:bill: So we'll do that for like you just go on Christmas this.
Speaker:Track 3: Is my tradition on.
Speaker:bill: Christmas your family eats Chinese food and goes to the movie theater color me shocked.
Speaker:Evan: I think we're the only ones who do that though like they open the movie theaters just for me.
Speaker:Track 3: Yeah I don't think anyone ever could possibly do those kind.
Speaker:bill: Of activities any other Jewish person in New York New Jersey.
Speaker:Evan: Yeah I don't usually see any I don't want to count. The Chinese restaurant has
Speaker:Evan: no line. There's, like, just me in the theater. You know, whatever.
Speaker:Evan: I just assumed it was because they like me. They let me do it.
Speaker:Evan: I do like, though, that it's subtitled.
Speaker:Evan: They don't, like, dub it, which is good. I mean, they don't usually dub these kind of movies anyway.
Speaker:bill: You know, it's funny, you know, that I didn't really think about.
Speaker:bill: And I'm curious as to whether the director really, like, intentionally,
Speaker:bill: you know, was making commentary in the private prison system.
Speaker:bill: But this is, if it wasn't intentional, this is a remarkable piece on the,
Speaker:bill: horrors of the carceral system and the private prison system in the United States.
Speaker:bill: And I actually don't know what the prison system in South Korea is like,
Speaker:bill: but this is an incredibly poignant,
Speaker:bill: or pointed criticism and observation of the manner in which the private prison
Speaker:bill: system functions and the way the carceral system does not function as a means
Speaker:bill: of rehabilitation, but instead,
Speaker:bill: destroys the humanity and community and sanity of people who are put into it.
Speaker:Track 3: I absolutely agree. And it's like the sexiest revenge film of all time.
Speaker:Evan: Yeah, I don't, I mean, his politics based purely on Wikipedia,
Speaker:Evan: I don't know him deeper than that. It seems like he-
Speaker:Track 3: We've got to watch the new one, I'm telling you. We've got to watch the new one.
Speaker:Evan: It seems like he sort of would consider himself like a progressive.
Speaker:Evan: It seems like his politic leaning, which doesn't mean he still couldn't make
Speaker:Evan: it. I mean, I think we've said this before.
Speaker:bill: But a progressive in South Korea is very different than a progressive in the United States.
Speaker:Evan: That's true. And I was going to say, like we were saying on numerous episodes
Speaker:Evan: is, whether or not he was intentionally thinking about it as a critique of the
Speaker:Evan: prison system, maybe not.
Speaker:Evan: But his knowledge of the prison system could have easily just become part of
Speaker:Evan: the plot unknowingly, which would probably be my thoughts.
Speaker:bill: Again, we return to reality is Marxist. Like, it is not our fault.
Speaker:bill: It is not our fault that, you know, information is Marxist.
Speaker:bill: Like, the observing reality and material conditions is Marxist and makes an
Speaker:bill: argument for Marxist thought and ideology. It's...
Speaker:bill: That's because it's an accurate description of the way things were.
Speaker:Track 3: So I'm looking up some stuff. Park Chan Woo said that one battle after another
Speaker:Track 3: was his favorite movie of the year.
Speaker:Track 3: It, quote, it touched me personally to watch a failed revolutionary on screen
Speaker:Track 3: as someone who was a college student in Korea during the 80s.
Speaker:Track 3: And then I saw people joking about, what was it?
Speaker:Track 3: He invited all of the CEOs of
Speaker:Track 3: the Fortune 500 companies to like a special screening of no other choice.
Speaker:Track 3: and people were making jokes referencing like the uh the theater scene from
Speaker:Track 3: inglorious bastards it's like please let it.
Speaker:bill: Happen i.
Speaker:Track 3: Think we did we really take it out of you on this one with this one bill.
Speaker:bill: It really shocked me it shocked me um i.
Speaker:Track 3: Was hoping it would.
Speaker:bill: I was not expecting that i
Speaker:bill: mean it made perfect sense in the
Speaker:bill: in the in the terms of the movie it made perfect sense it was still insane and
Speaker:bill: crazy though yes um i just like it's like that's so and like especially because
Speaker:bill: it's like she didn't do anything to you man like she didn't do anything to you
Speaker:bill: this poor girl like she didn't fucking do anything to you man like no what the fuck,
Speaker:bill: what the fuck man like there's something about the the villains like wujin that
Speaker:bill: really bother me Those kinds of villains that try to put their shit on other people.
Speaker:bill: Like it really bothers me. I'm like, you don't get like,
Speaker:bill: own your shit like straight up like own your shit like if you're gonna like be it fuck.
Speaker:Track 3: You can own that penthouse but you can't own your shit.
Speaker:bill: Like be a bad
Speaker:bill: person like i'm gonna judge you but like fucking like
Speaker:bill: own it like you know like don't
Speaker:bill: put your shit on other people don't you
Speaker:bill: know like make out like it's because you like
Speaker:bill: dude you fucked your sister like and you
Speaker:bill: you liked it like you're like like
Speaker:bill: this is your fault like all
Speaker:bill: of these actions everything everything that
Speaker:bill: happened here i'm not saying desu
Speaker:bill: is a great guy but like most of
Speaker:bill: even his like not being a good person has no
Speaker:bill: bit no relation to you at all none
Speaker:bill: whatsoever like what happened
Speaker:bill: to your sister barely has a relation to him like
Speaker:bill: you're projecting and looking for excuses to make yourself feel better about
Speaker:bill: the horrible shit you're doing to this person because in reality you have no
Speaker:bill: justification for what you're doing and i i villains like that make me angry
Speaker:bill: like personally like i fucking hate it it makes me so angry i'm.
Speaker:Track 3: So glad you watched this then because like i mean he reinforces that from like
Speaker:Track 3: pretty early on as the bad guy going like whether it's a rock or a grain of
Speaker:Track 3: sand they both sink the same and it's just truly a grain of sand that he is making into a rock yeah.
Speaker:bill: I just i'm.
Speaker:Track 3: So glad you watched it.
Speaker:bill: Guys it makes me so angry it's up there with it's up there with the villain
Speaker:bill: saying to the hero if you strike me down you're just as bad as me fuck you fuck
Speaker:bill: yourself no it's not no no I'm not,
Speaker:bill: This is the same thing. It's the same thing for me.
Speaker:bill: I like villains where it's like they put their shit on other people.
Speaker:bill: They're like, you know, look what you made me do.
Speaker:bill: It's the look at what you made me do thing. And it makes me so angry.
Speaker:bill: Own your shit. That is my like lesson in life for like, like own your shit.
Speaker:bill: Read Lennon, grow up, own your shit. Fucking there you go.
Speaker:Track 3: Yeah.
Speaker:Evan: I think that's.
Speaker:Track 3: I like it. I like it too. Cause it's like, he tries to hold his like romantic
Speaker:Track 3: vision of himself as a person. Woojin.
Speaker:bill: Yeah.
Speaker:Track 3: And it's like, it's funny because when Deisu gets in the fucking elevator with
Speaker:Track 3: him, he's just like, you fucked your sister.
Speaker:bill: Yeah.
Speaker:Track 3: I love it because it's just like, all of that goes out the window.
Speaker:bill: And he does not like that.
Speaker:Evan: He thinks it's so, he's like, I fucking got you, motherfucker.
Speaker:Evan: And then he's like, you should have waited 15 minutes, buddy.
Speaker:Track 3: Yeah. Like, it just hits him so bluntly. You fucked your sister.
Speaker:Track 3: I know. It's a great time. And if you didn't watch it and you're still listening,
Speaker:Track 3: why the fuck didn't you watch it?
Speaker:Evan: Pause it right now.
Speaker:Track 3: I hope you do go watch it.
Speaker:Evan: Well, thanks everyone for listening to Left Projector. Follow,
Speaker:Evan: subscribe, and subscribe to the Patreon. And we'll catch you next time with Bill and Ward.
Speaker:Track 3: Have a good one.
Speaker:bill: Have a good one, folks.
