Have you ever watched a movie and only realized about 3/4 of the way through that… it feels awfully like I’ve watched this before? This was what happened not too long ago when I watched Oldboy (2013). Except I hadn’t watched this version of the movie, so I hadn’t watched it before, exactly. But I had watched the original Korean Oldboy (2003), and while there were some differences and to be quite honest I didn’t remember that much about the premise of it (or at least I didn’t remember enough to read the synopsis for the American remake of the movie and go “hey, I think I’ve seen this before”), by the time the big plot twist/reveal happened, I realized I’d seen some version of it, because I knew exactly what was happening – unfortunately not early enough to not have watched most of the movie, but it dawned on me that yes, I had watched the original, and that yes, even though I didn’t remember much of the original, it felt like the original was better*.

If you haven’t watched Oldboy, I won’t spoil it for you – it’s a bit of a doozy – but I’d recommend watching the original Korean one, if you’re interested in it. I feel as though we must’ve talked about Korean psychological horrors & thrillers before on this blog**, but there’s something about the art of psychological thriller, whether it’s going way beyond anything you might’ve considered in the realm of possibility for the film or in the subtle horror of seemingly nothing really happening in particular, that I find Korean cinema has perfected to a T, and with both TIFF and October coming up, this feels like a good time to share some unsettling recommendations.