Oldboy

I can’t say I enjoyed Oldboy, a recent Netflix rental; I thought it would be more in the vein of chop-socky/gunplay/action-adventure when it’s instead a discomforting psychological thriller about torture, revenge and masochism, set to a pleasant orchestral score, much as A Clockwork Orange is set to a pleasant orchestral score. Consider that Oldboy’s squirm-worthy scenes include but are not limited to:

• tooth removal by hammer claw
• tongue removal by knife
• vivid hallucination of ants under skin
• man jabbed in eye with toothbrush
• man killed with compact disk
• consumption of live octopus