Star News, quoting Variety magazine — reports that Steven Spielberg will be producing the Hollywood remake of Park Chan-wook’s masterpiece “Oldboy.” He’ll also be handling casting.
Choi Min-shik’s character will be performed by Will Smith.
Steven Spielberg, Will Smith to Do Remake of ‘Oldboy’
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{ 41 comments… read them below or add one }
Will Smith could pull it off. He made “I am Legend” watchable all the way until the last 30 minutes of the movie.
I just hope they do the “hammer fight” scene right, it being one of my all-time favorite movie fight scenes: http://kr.youtube.com/watch?v=NY1lpIf5Jmg
I like Will Smith but I think this is a really, really bad idea. Choi Min-shik *made* that character and I don’t think Will Smith wants to go out on a limb. This just makes me wonder if Will Smith is getting any decent scripts at all too.
Smith will invite unwanted comparisons to the original too.
This movie will suck. The whole motive for revenge (incest) will be left-out.
***SPOILER ALERT***
Even if Hollywood allows it, there’s no way Will Smith will allow himself to be in a scene where he bangs his daughter.
Can someone explain to me the point in “remaking” movies that are clearly excellent to begin with? Those people who can’t handle it in its original format shouldn’t be appeased, let alone encouraged.
And Will Smith? The last time I saw a Will Smith flick was Independence Day, one of the most vomitous pieces of jingoistic fucktardery in cinematic history.
Pass.
I like Choi Min-sik in Oldboy. I totally agree with R.Elgin. I’d like to see Gary Oldman play this role.
Also others that I think that could play Oldboy:
Clive Owen
Hugo Weaving (Agent Smith)
Let’s see…
Christina Ricci plays Oldboy’s daughter (and I want to see her funbags).
Ellen Page? (does she need bigger tatas?)
Will Smith could play the rich guy
Karl Urban for the bodyguard
Vin Diesel for the Mafia boss (I’d like to see him get his teeth knocked out)
The hard part is trying to figure who’s Oldboy’s daughter… Someone young, very pretty, fragile, and have a motherly aura. Ellen Page doesn’t quite cut it.
#2,
I agree. Will Smith would have to lose himself in the role like Choi Min-Shik did, and I’m not convinced he is able or willing to do that.
#3,
Well, there goes the movie. The whole subtext is based on the Oedipus tales.
#5,
“I’d like to see Gary Oldman play this role.”
Well, there, you’ve just ruined any chance that I’ll bother to watch that movie.
Gary Oldman would be fucking amazing.
Per Gary Oldman, I would have to agree with you guys. He is a fine actor and I would almost be afraid to see what he would do with the role because it would be scary.
Even with Spielberg’s masterful touch, I don’t see how Hollywood could improve on this masterpiece, and I see many, many ways in which they could diminish it.
I’m getting a preemptive sense of embarrassment.
Oops The hard part is figuring out the rich guy’s sister.
Want to agree — I think Kim Ki-duk said something to the effect that “If Hollywood likes these movies so much, why don’t they just show them.” Unfortunately, I believe foreign-language films do quite poorly in the US market, so it might be more lucrative to remake them with big-name US actors, even if the remakes turn out like shit.
If a remake is going to be made, I really like the Gary Oldman idea. He’d be perfect.
Marmot said: “foreign-language films do quite poorly in the US market,”
Well, this serves as a nice reality check from my recent Obama-fueled America-is-great lovefest. I’d almost forgotten, Americans can’t read and watch a movie at the same time.
I too like Gary Oldman for the role. Or, how ’bout Daniel Day Lewis?
What about Harvey Keitel?! THAT would be good. Could you imagine? Talk about losing your self in a role! Bad Lieutennant meets Oh Dae Soo.
Well with will Smith being black the daughter will have to be black and twenty-ish. Probably not too famous otherwise the incest and played down sex scene will ruin her image.
Also I think people forget that the plausibility of the 20 year sequestration of Choi Min-shik was the semi-fascist state of korea. It is hard to imagine how that would occur in America. I would be interested how they manage to get that one through the door.
Luckily Maine makes the incest plot quite easy to believe!
You call that a fight scene, Andy? This is a FIGHT SCENE.
What’s interesting is that the South Korean government originally banned “Back to the Future I” under the pretense that it involved incest because of the scene where Michael J. Fox kissed his future mother in the front seat of a car.
Through some mixup at the airport, where bean pies are discovered in his luggage, dashiki-wearing Harvard-trained corporate lawyer Will Smith spends 20 years locked up in a “rendition” facility by runaway, racist Department of Homeland Security thugs holding over from the Bushitler Administration. Shielded by evil Liberty University hacks that the Obamessiah can’t root out of the former Department of Injustice, the Homeland Security men make a determined enemy out of happy-go-lucky Will Smith until the day, after being sprung by the ACLU, he returns to seek vengeance Big Willie Style. Product placement by BMW, Apple, and Adidas. Free massages by the Dianetics “Tech” Center.
I’d also rather see Gary Oldman or Daniel Day Lewis taking out a hammer and beating the crap out of a bunch of guys. But Will Smith will have to do, I guess.
I think Daniel Day Lewis would be the best. He already demonstrated in two separate successful movies that he can portray a psychopath without blinking an eye… Or maybe Gary Oldman should be Oh Dae Su and Daniel Day Lewis be Lee Woo Jin (the other psychopath).
Jeremy Irons? maybe too old. Russel Crowe, I could imagine him sleeping with his daughter and the revenge and the fighting (instead of a hammer a phone?). Billy bob thorton, finds out Angelina Jolie is his daughter?
Will Smith may do a reasonable job though, I just can’t believe that it will not go worng somewhere.
Josh Brolin for Oh Daesu would be perfect. Will Smith would be a good “rich guy” (Yu Jitae character.) For the girl, maybe Anne Hathaway?
all the daum readers seem to agree with the gary oldman idea, from the number of “recommend’s” that a comment got. another comment from daum imagining the trailer had me in stitches. i cut and paste it for those who read korean, as the link to it was as long as the actual comment. it’s just the way it sounds, a translated korean dialogue from a hollywood dialogue, with an ending everyone knows already.
스필버그 윌스미스라니-_- 왠지 예고편은.. 15년동안 피자만 먹고 갇혀있다가 어느날 풀려나왔다. 하지만 길거리에는 아무도 존재하지 않는다. 대체 누가 날 가뒀고… 아무도 없는데 누가 날 풀어준걸까. 옆에 박살난 경찰차가 있다. 난 찾아낸 총을 들고 인적을 찾아 헤맨다. 대체 내가 없는 동안 무슨일이 일어난거지? 두둥. 올여름 당신의 심장을 강타할 초대형 블록버스터가 다가온다. 갑자기 알수없는 존재가 주인공을 공격하기 시작하고 핸드폰이 울린다. “갇혀있던 이유가 궁금해? 잘 생각해봐. 왜 너 혼자만이 살아남있는건지 말이야.” 2009년 감히 예측할 수 없는 최고의 스릴러. 올드보이. 띠리리리. “누구야 넌!!!” 후아재미없다-_-
I can’t watch African-Americans, especially in film. I can barely watch sports.
That’s Hollywood’s new business model. Remakes. 3 out of 5 movies that have been released in recent years have been a rehash of an older movie, or a defunct TV show, a familiar comic book hero, or an appropriation of an indie-quality East Asian film. This trend is set to continue.
There is really very little about “Oldboy” that begs for a Spielberg remake starring Will Smith. It is difficult to picture Smith devouring a live octopus, one of the signature scenes from the original. It makes zero sense solely from the perspective of artistic integrity. But if you remember that Hollywood is just another kind of a greedy corporate entity, then suddenly it all clicks into place.
If I had to pick the directorship, it would be the Coen brothers. Spielberg and Will Smith are too conventionally mainstream. What they are trying to do here is to take an edgy, proven script, slap some any old big-name recognition onto it, and hope that it turns out to be a money-generating blockbuster. But if that doesn’t do it, the fact that Oldboy will have to be modified to suit the tastes of the average American moviegoer pretty much guarantees that the remake is going to suck.
i have to agree with Seth… This is being made by Universal Studios by Steven Spielberg… This is going to try to capture the mainstream american audience… No way in HELL we are going to see the same ending. Will Smith is a great actor, but I just can’t see him in a very angst ridden role. If they want a young guy, go with Christian Bale… Although Gary Oldman would be perfect, producers at Universal probably understands that if they want to make money, they need someone like Will Smith…
The thing about Will Smith and “I am Legend”… that film totally rips up the original intent of Richard Matheson’s story. The beautiful ending of Matheson’s novel is completely thrown out to give it a happy-go-lucky hollywood ending to please all the 13 year olds that watch action flicks.
I personally can’t see Steven Spielberg, the master of happy hollywood endings keeping the grittiness of the original. The only thing this film will have in common with the original is the mystery of imprisonment and revenge. The villain will be nowhere near diabolical or multi-faceted as the original.
This movie is going to suck donkeyballs.
Man.. if I would have more optimism if Spielberg and Will Smith were remaking “President’s Last Bang” than this…
I blame Obama.
@16, Brendon, that’s bloody hilarious!
As a director, Spielberg seems like a truly unfortunate choice. This is, after all, the guy who’s built a career on movies bathed in soft or sparkling light. Still, he can surprise: he also crafted ‘Schindler’s List’ (albeit while still playing around with lighting elements), so who knows? With Spielberg at the helm, there’s a chance at greatness. But if that doesn’t happen, it’s gonna suck to high heaven, and go straight to the sales shelves at Blockbuster. Upside? ’1942′ won’t be his only mistake.
Yeah, Brendon’s #16 nailed it. Spielberg . . . “a chance for greatness”? The big suck monster is hard on his tail.
Spielberg should have tried remaking “Host” with Will Smith, except they could have some Korean restaurant owner dumping some bad kimchi-chigae into the Hudson, complete with frowning South-American workers muttering “muyeo locco”.
I think “So Far from the Bamboo Grove” would make a good Spielberg movie. I believe it would have the potential of outdoing “ET” at the box office.
Christian Bale would get right into this character. Yeah Oldman would also be great…
This film will never survive. The octopus scene won’t translate into a western meal… What live food do we eat? And for it to be a blockbuster it will need to get an M rating at the most.
There goes the gratuitous violence and some of the concepts that won’t sit well in that rating… No incest, little revenge, not much violence.
Plus, if they use a young[ish] actor, how are they going to explain the 20 year sequestration…? Probably, àla Hollywood, with a shrug and a dazzling smile. Bah.
If Stanley Kubrick was alive, he could totally remake this film and make it more screwed up and better.
Even Scorcese screwed up with Departed by screwing around with the superior ending in the original Infernal Affairs, so I just can’t see Spielberg pulling this off…
Although I have this glimmer of hope that Spielberg and Will Smith wants to “reinvent” themselves to showcase their true range of abilities but… bah!
On the other hand, if this remake is simply “inspired” by “Old Boy” there is some hope that at the very least this will be a watchable film. If he tries to stick too close to the original, it can seriously turn out like that Bollywood remake, Zinda…
“What’s interesting is that the South Korean government originally banned “Back to the Future I” under the pretense that it involved incest because of the scene where Michael J. Fox kissed his future mother in the front seat of a car.”
Hmm… that was in the 80′s before there was any of this “let’s protect our film” movement.
#31,
Man, Christian Bale… Why didn’t I think of that one? He was amazing in The Machinist.
“Hmm… that was in the 80’s before there was any of this “let’s protect our film” movement.”
Old videos would often be interrupted halfway by a public announcement against porn.
really? i didn’t know that. hahahaha
I don’t rate Oldboy so highly. It is a ‘good flick’ and definitely ‘must-see,’ but not a film with substance, not a film I digest like a man who’s had a full course meal made from the most wholesome and nutritious highbrow ingredients..
I would have liked to see Oh Desu by a mundane light. A viewer doesn’t at all get quiet, raw moments of anguish or other psychedelia in the film. Instead he’s given high-charged, Hollywood story-telling with a lot of humor and one-dimensional characterization. There’s no appreciable gravitas in the movie. Oldboy is driven by story and entertainment, and not so much the drive to represent anything outside of its story. It is a work of pure, juvenile fiction, and, also, is almost everything which Park’s eallier, grittier film Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance ain’t..
The only dissonance I feel when I read about a Hollywood remake is that, I think, Korean film has a propensity for visceral violence, violence with the mangled flesh, blood, and all — but with biological, unpoetic blood, a hospital sort of clinical blood and violdence, violence without the sweetened flare and melodramatic bleeding typical of American films. Hollywood won’t be able to translate such things very well.
#38,
Sure, the movie has its flaws, but, as you said, it’s a good flick and definitely a must-see.
I always thought Oldboy was entertaining and visually pleasing, but never too deep or substantial. That honor goes to Sympathy for Lady Vengeance in my opinion, my favorite out of Park’s trilogy.
My gut tells me that any movie that Spielberg and Smith dish up that borrows from Oldboy will also use the manga that Oldboy was based on for material as well.
I breezed through the Oldboy manga and I actually think it would be easier for Hollywood to remake than the South Korean film (i.e. the manga doesn’t have the incest centered plot).
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