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Park Chan-wook’s “Oldboy,” a South Korean revenge thriller from 2003, has become sacred material in cult circles, who often laud the film as one of the best Asian flicks of the last few decades.
Those same fans likely scoffed at the notion of an inevitable U.S. remake, which had Steven Spielberg and Will Smith attached before passing into the hands of Spike Lee, who’d direct Josh Brolin as the damaged, galvanized lead. The end result? A mixed bag, to say the least, and one whose fan approval seems uncertain.
Brolin is Joe Doucett, a boozy, reprehensible ad exec who, in 1993, is mysteriously kidnapped and locked in a small room for no known reason. On a monitor in his motel-style cell, he sees that he’s been framed for the murder of his wife, leaving him a fugitive and his young daughter an orphan. Twenty years pass before Joe is inexplicably released, and his new mission in life, apart from striving to patch things up with his daughter, is to find out who imprisoned him and why.
For roughly the first half, Lee, a formidable filmmaker, turns his take on this story into a gleefully unabashed B-movie, from the evocative film grain he employs for the early-nineties segments to the intentional over-emoting of, say, Joe’s wife (Hannah Ware) and Joe himself. It’s all wonderfully effective in its distinctly campy style, and Lee caps it off with glorious, one-take fight scenes after Joe’s release (think “The Warriors” meets “Street Fighter”).
But as Joe’s investigation continues, and he meets mysterious friend Marie (Elizabeth Olsen) and mysterious foe Adrian (Sharlto Copley), Lee’s tone shifts into degradingly earnest territory, as if he couldn’t find a balance between sensationalism and sentiment. Olsen is perfection as the movie’s moral center, but her awards-caliber acting isn’t in step with the rest of the piece. Copley, meanwhile, leans heavily toward the offensive, playing a warped sexual deviant ostracized for his “weirdness.” Lee has the chops to pull off this remake without a hitch, so it’s that much more of a letdown that his attempt is only half-successful.
Oldboy
R
Two reels out of four
Now playing at area theaters
Recommended Rental
The Wolverine
PG-13
Available Tuesday
Returning, for the fifth time, to the role he was born to play, Hugh Jackman is back as everyone’s favorite X-Man, this time flying solo in a cross-continental tale, which shuffles Wolverine off to Japan for an adventure linked to his troubled past. Offering action and drama that’s as well-choreographed as it is respectful to its locale, James Mangold directs one of the best superhero movies of the year, which stands out for not feeling like a boilerplate superhero film at all. ■
Comment and see the trailers for this week’s movies at southphillyreview.com/arts-and-entertainment/movies.
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