 | There are numerous superbly choreographed struggle scenes in cinema—from the stylized gun-fu of John Wick, to the brutal effectivity of the Bourne sequence, and the jaw-dropping martial artistry of The Raid movies. As an enormous fan of trendy motion, I genuinely take pleasure in these sequences—they’re mesmerizing, like watching a violent dance efficiency, crafted with precision and aptitude. I’m not right here to undermine that model in any respect. However the hall struggle scene in Oldboy (2003) is on a totally totally different wavelength. Regardless of being choreographed like every other motion scene, it feels unbelievably uncooked and grounded. There’s a realism to it that makes you assume, “Yeah, somebody with some coaching—karate, kung fu, no matter—would possibly truly struggle like this in an actual road scenario.” What units it aside? It’s not an influence fantasy. Dae-su doesn’t effortlessly take out each goon. He struggles—onerous. He will get hit. He limps. He will get knocked down. The struggle seems to be prefer it hurts. Nobody’s actually “out.” By the tip of it, the goons aren’t all dramatically KO’d. They’re simply drained, like him. Mendacity round, exhausted. That alone makes it really feel extremely human. It’s shot in a single steady take. The one-shot method provides to the immersion, eradicating the glossy edits and methods that often glamorize violence. It feels such as you’re trapped in that hallway with him. For me, this scene stands as one of the lifelike depictions of close-quarters fight in cinema. It's not clear. It's not heroic. It's messy, determined, and unforgettable. Would love to listen to what others assume—does Oldboy’s hallway struggle nonetheless maintain up because the gold commonplace of uncooked motion? submitted by /u/Sea-Visitor-1299 |
