How does Oldboy help individuals/society imitate and justify immoral behaviour
Imitation has always been a dangerous topic for the media influenced generation, fingers are pointed and bans are put in place to try and make sure that society does not go too far too mimic what we see on screen, however when we get to the topic of violence it’s clear that it’s down to the way in which it is presented to the meaning it has, so there are times when we are left sat on the line between right and wrong. A famous socialist John Elridge approaches this dilemma “ Eldridge presses the point that causal claims rest on decisions about how the casual stimuli are identified and he re-raises general issues about how images of violence are contextualized and given meaning so as to lead to one response rather than another.”
(SusanL. Hurley, Nick Chater.(2005), Perspectives on Imitation: Imitation, human development, and culture , MiT Press , Page 39 )
Park Chan Wook like so many of today’s most intrusive twisted film makers appears on the surface as the sweetest and most modest of people any aspiring film lover could ever hope to meet, it’s an absolute stretch of the imagination that he is the dark mind behind the many convoluted nightmares he has created.
Thus began the creation of the vengeance trilogy a series of three films focusing on revenge and a demonstration of the dead ended path it places you on. The films in order were; sympathy for Mr. Vengeance, Oldboy and sympathy for lady vengeance. The middle project “Oldboy” is the one, which insighted the most the megalomaniac themes of Chan Wooks ideas of justified revenge .
Park Chan Wook when asked about his choice of theme said he was intrigued by the absolute futility of those seeking vengeance. Many perspectives say that the object of revenge is to regain a sense of lost power. “Dr. Steinmetz, a German authority, takes the view that revenge is essentially rooted in the feeling of power and authority, its aim is to enhance the self feeling which has been lowered or degraded by the injury suffered”
(William McDougall, (2003), An Introduction to Social Psychology, Courier Dover Publications, page 121)
This ideal fits perfectly with the revenge sort after by oh dae su.
Now what strikes me initially as I’m watching Oldboy for the first time is no matter how far Oh Dae Su goes on his pursue of revenge from removing teeth to mass assault it’s nearly impossible not to route for him, we know that he must have been imprisoned for a reason a reason which was more then likely justified however as the protagonist the audience’s views of moral behaviour are obscured we want Oh Dae Su to get his revenge, we want Oh Dae Su to kill who did this to him without even knowing if he deserved it or not , by the end of the first 20 minutes we have been turned into the same beast as Oh Dae Su and we want revenge just as much as he does. This is because we sympathize with his conditions which causes us to make an emotional connection which clouds our judgements of moral behaviour.
What Park Chan-Wook has done is glorified a character hell bent on revenge to the point of being cool, Oh Dae Su is a very stylish character from his clothes to his hair and fearless attitude, by making a character cool their are always going to be people who want to imitate them because cool is popular even if it’s for the right reasons or not, Oldboy sets a mark in society by unwillingly inviting people to imitate Oh Dae Su because people will see him as a icon and their will be a majority of people who idolise his demeanour and his behaviour.
“Whether it be a grain of sand or a rock, in water they sink alike”
A quote from the film, which holds a monumental amount of weight towards the themes, it suggests. Every action committed upon another whether intentional, accidental, wrong or right, guilty or innocent, the expression here is that it is only the end consequence which holds any merit and it is upon this that the action be judged. This is an interpretation of this piece of dialogue which is repeated throughout the film and it is how the antagonist Woo-Jin Lee Justifies his eventually actions to Oh Dae Su.
Oh Dae Su accidentally spreads the rumour that Woo-Jin Lee was sexually active with his sister by telling a friend what he saw in a school class room one day, he did not mean for this rumour to be spread or to negatively effect anyone involved however the sister found out and due to social shame and self hatred committed suicide, Woo-Jin Lee saw this as Oh Dae Su’s fault as if he directly murdered his sister though this was not his intentions at all and at the penultimate moment of the film accepts the blame and responsibility for these actions.
The social implications of this if absorbed by the audience are that any problems or misfortunes in your life can easily be blamed on to a person who contributed to the cause of it happening. For example a hypothetical situation, I am driving my car down a road and another car crashes into me, I am injured, the car which drove Into me was previously at a fast food restaurant where their order was incorrect so they had to wait an extra five minutes as the problem was corrected, now if the order had been correct in the first place then I would not of been drove into, so in theory the man who messed up the order was the cause of my accident and not the driver so it his him whom I should seek revenge upon.
Basically what were discussing is the butterfly effect which makes it possible to blame any small action committed by someone else for everything that has happened to you and to direct your anger in their direction instead of accepting responsibility your self. This attitude that Woo-Jin Lee shows takes away any care for a person’s intent simply focusing on what has happened and this type of behavior makes it impossible to ever forgive another human being for what they have done, most worryingly Oh Dae Su seems to share this view when it comes to the final scene in the pent house office, now whether this is due to the fact that he know Woo-Jin Lee is in control of his daughters future is unclear but the message is as disturbing none the less.
In real life a drastic example of this happening was the horrifying occurrence nicknamed the Virginia Tech massacre the instigator of these terrible crimes Cho Seung Huia 23 year old South Korean descent student killing 32 people and injuring a further 25 described himself as being oppressed by the rich and was sick of the debauchery. He was in fact blaming others for his own reclusive behavior, through their own auras of superiority he seemed to think they were indirectly responsible for his own reclusive depressive behavior by not acknowledging him as an equal, his own rants seemed to be borrowed from the Oldboy movie itself, with Cho seeing himself as the repressed hero of Oh Dae Su who must overcome and seek revenge on others, the others being the rich and those full of debauchery just like the main antagonist of Woo-Jin Lee in the movie. Many sources claimed immediately that cho was imitating scenes from the movie oldboy, “ cho was re- enacting scenes from a violent south Korean movie when he massacred 32 students and teachers, police believe”
(By L. Andrew Cooper (2010) Gothic realities: the impact of horror fiction on modern culture, McFarland, page 174)
Further from merely depicting similar acts of violence it could also be said that cho had “ a desire for a spotlight that depicts him in the same manner of his favorite movies heroes”
The themes of Oldboy allowed Cho to hide behind the same principle of “whether it be a grain of sand or a rock, in water they sink alike” so although no one at Virginia tech had directly meant to influence or cause Cho to feel the way he did the fact that he believed them to be the cause of his problems was enough reason to exact his revenge. Not only was Cho imitating the behaviour of Oh Dae Su he was also hiding behind the movies motifs to justify what he had done, he saw himself as a hero even describing himself closely to Jesus Christ as a saviour for overcoming this terrible nemesis. Cho was described as being a fan of the movie Oldboy.
(Msn news Alex Johnson with NBC’s Pete Williams , Published: 4.17.2007)
The comparison to old boy of these tragic events can be argued to be ambiguous and unfair, the blame is put upon the media instead of the individual really one can be held completely accountable for their actions and not blame influence from media , everyone interprets media in a different way so it may be unfair to make the connection between the vagina tech massacre and Oldboy. ‘ Oldboy bears no more responsibility for the Virginia Tech shootings then American Idol”
(Jinhee Choi, Mitsuyo Wada-Marciano, (2009), Horror to the extreme: changing boundaries in Asian cinema, Hong Kong University Press page 231)
Throughout Oldboy we see within the film itself many recurring forms of imitation and justification. First of all Oh Dae Su removes Park Cheol-woong’s teeth with a hammer whom is the owner of the prison stating he is removing one for each year of imprisonment, later on the tables are turned as he attempts to do the same back to Oh Dae Su only to be cut short by his boss. This is similar to the time old statement of an eye for an eye, Oldboy firmly sets the precedent that whatever is done on to you may be fairly done on to others. It proves that allot of our actions especially those which are sinful transcend our own creativity and are instead quite often borrowed from else where demonstrating how easy it is to copy someone else’s behaviour , even more so when it has been done on to you as it is justified and accepted as a realistic way to act. It is messages like this that society takes from the film, acting towards another as someone as acted towards you.
In The final act of revenge Woo-Jin Lee reveals how he has tricked Oh Dae Su into sleeping with his daughter much akin to Oh Dae Su spreading the rumour that Lee slept with his sister and got her pregnant this again demonstrates yet another imitation of his own actions, showing that revenge is easily suggestible and justified again using the proof that it has been done on to me so it is only fair to do the same back.
Imitation comes in other forms in this movie for example watching television for 15 years Oh Dae Su converts from being himself to a shell filled with information learnt form the television, disposing of any morals beliefs he might have had and instead inheriting those seen from shows and movies, I believe this is a huge statement on how society is affected by media consumption. Perhaps If Oh Dae Su was watching Will and Grace for 15 years he might not have been so willing to pursue such a brutal revenge.
Social acceptance is what drives us to make moral decisions as social acceptance isn’t the same now it wont be the same in 10 years time we are governed by the laws of the time we live in, in reading the book the American deception an insight is gained into how current stimuli in the media affects us. “It is quite apparent from the reseach thus presented that procuring social acceptance is a primary movitvating factor determining whether individuals will repeat learned behaviours”
(Thomas D Sharts, (2007), The American Deception, Self Published, Page 77)
Every time an unthinkable act is committed by a younger individual society races to blame some sort of media outlet for influencing this act; the columbine killings were blamed on the students love of the matrix, the Paducah killings were blamed on the basketball diaries and as previously mentioned Oldboy was blamed for the virgin tech massacre. I cant help but compare Oh Dae Su’s prison to that of every kid now growing up confined to their living rooms absorbing the same education and role models much alike to Oh Dae Su , witnessing acts being committed in movies and on TV with heroes more and more starting to resemble the villains, society is providing the youth with the wrong role models, with the dawn of the internet parents have little control over what their children watch, as Oh Dae Su says “ Can 15 years of imaginary training be put to use?” what training from the media are these kids putting to use are they really beginning to subconsciously imitate the behaviour of what they see on TV, I believe they are I believe that these outlets of information and entertainment have become a replacement for intellectual growth and discipline in these individual life’s.
This is speculation in theory but there is also study and there are results, which eventually lead to proof, in 1961 a leading psychologist named Albert Bandura conducted an aggressive behaviour imitation test on a group of children named the bobo doll experiment, in this experiment children were placed in a room with an adult and a bobo doll, in one control scenario the bobo doll would be attacked by the adult and in the other the adult would gently play with the doll. The adult would then leave the room and the children would be left alone with the doll to act how they chose to. “The results were conclusive in proving that the control group featuring the aggressive adult caused the children to act and imitate the aggression they saw both verbally and physically, the children who did not view the aggressive adult exhibited far less aggressive behaviour both physically and verbally”
(Tina Abbott ,(2001), Social and Personality Development, Routledge
page 38 )
This test has been repeated time and time again over the years and the results yielded are always as conclusive.
This goes to prove that aggressive behaviour is not innate but learnt, we are shaped by what we see and hear. Oh Dae Su acted out the aggression and violence he had learnt from television and copied the words “dick shit” used by a gang of youths against him later on in the film. So often catchphrases from television shows and quotes from movies are used in real life we are borrowing from fictional characters way to express ourselves, so in reality we are imitating those who came up with these words and acting as they would.
The justifications the characters present for their actions at the climax of the film is surely the most conclusive evidence that it’s hard to draw a line between right and wrong when presented with circumstances which warrant both for all involved. As the end credits roll the audience is truly puzzled as to whether Oh Dae Su deserved the revenge or if Woo-Jin lee did or even if they were both equally wrong.
The film mesmerizes so much with it’s style that the audience is eventually desensitized by the evil acts and it is this desensitization that carries through into the audiences real life and through this our own morals which we use to merit an action upon are obscured and influenced by what we’ve seen . Like with anything however this desensitization to violence is caused by over exposure it is not oldboy alone but a centuary of media violence which has changed what we find acceptable and what we dont, by read Media Effects Research “Media violence may have a desensitizing effect, making us numb to violence in real life so that we dont react to it as we would if we had never seen it on the screen”
(Glenn G. Sparks (2009), Media Effects Research: A Basic Overview , Cengage Learning, page 92)
Ultimately if one was to watch Oldboy and be truly engulfed by it’s themes and messages then it would be easy to duplicate this in real life against society , the movie is so smart in how it expresses cause and effect for behaviour that it’s easy to use these opinions as a guideline for your own life , it can be argued that it is down to the viewer to separate fiction from reality and that it is only a movie so the viewer should be intelligent enough to understand that it is not real and not a betrayal of real life , however it is impossible to unwatch a movie or completely erase it from your memory so with that said we can not truly be aware of how we have been influenced even if we believe it to be not at all. Oldboy provides those who wish to fully indulge in its obscenity with enough sensibility to imitate and justify similar actions and behaviour. Revenge is shown to be an acceptable reaction even to the point of murder and torture yet the audience still sides with the main character. Leading to the opinion that cause and effect is an acceptable defence as demonstrated by Oldboy.
Bibliography
Information on Park Chan-Wook:
Imdb bio
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0661791/
Date accessed: 26.02.2011
Oldboy DVD disk 2 Bonus Interviews
DVD released 2004
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Wiki page
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oldboy
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Information on Seung-Hui Cho and Virgina tech:
Wiki Page
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seung-Hui_Cho
Date accessed: 03.03.2011
Msn news
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18134671/ns/us_news-crime_and_courts/
Authors: Alex Johnson with NBC’s Pete Williams
Published: 4.17.2007
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Wiki Page
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bobo_doll_experiment
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Title: Behavior analysis and learning
Author: W. David Pierce, Carl D. Cheney
Page: 310
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SusanL. Hurley, Nick Chater. Page 39, MiT Press Published 2005
An Introduction to Social Psychology
By William McDougall page 121 Courier Dover Publications,published 2003
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By L. Andrew Cooper page 174, Hong Kong University Press
Published 2010
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Social and Personality Development
By Tina Abbott , page 38 , Routledge, Published 2001
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Media Effects Research: A Basic Overview
By Glenn G. Sparks , Cengage Learning, Page 92, Published 2009
Date Accessed: 21.03.1990
Horror to the extreme: changing boundaries in Asian cinema: Jinhee Choi, Mitsuyo Wada-Marciano, page 231 published 15 May 2009
Date Accessed: 26.03.1990
