This week's readings analyzed the crisis of Korean masculinity in the film "The Stray Bullet"; however, this same crisis is evident in the film "Old Boy."  Like the male protagonists of "The Stray Bullet," Oh Dae-Su is emasculated following his capture and most evidently, at the end of the film when he falls to Lee Woo-Jin's feet barking like a dog.  During his fifteen years of imprisonment, Oh Dae-Su is constantly the object to be looked at either by Lee Woo-Jin or one of the overseers in the building.  In a structure reminiscent of the Panopticon, though with some marked differences in style and purpose, Oh Dae-Su is drained of power: he cannot see his captors and he does not know if they are looking on though the potential they are is always present.  One interesting difference between the prison in "Old Boy" and the Panopticon is that while the latter relies entirely on glass windows, the prison in "Old Boy" is marked by a lack of any traditional windows in favor of a single television that serves as the prisoner's window to the world.  Ironically though, as in the Panopticon, Oh Dae-Su's effective window to the world, his only freedom and opening, is the same medium that his captors use to watch him and that is central to his emasculation.  

When Oh Dae-Su is freed from the prison, he is completely disoriented and without, further illustrating his emasculation.  Indeed, even though he feels he is free, he is told and soon finds for himself that he is only living in a bigger prison.  This theme of the cage is found in both films and relates to the powerlessness experienced by the characters, both male and female.  The extremely violent acts Oh Dae-Su commits indicate an overcompensation for his lack that is traditionally feminine and that Joyrich sees as an example of hypermasculinity.  Over the course of the film, Oh Dae-Su discovers that he is less and less his own person; in the final scene with Lee Woo-Jin, Lee Woo-Jin tells Oh Dae-Su that he was controlled by auto-suggestion.  However, Oh Dae-Su's loss of identity reaches a new height in the climactic scene where he prostrates himself, barking like a dog, in front of Lee Woo-Jin.  This scene illustrates Oh Dae-Su's complete loss of identity and he truly becomes no better than a beast.  The question remains whether Oh Dae-Su ever regains his identity or whether this is even possible.  It seems that he is forever altered.  Despite having split himself from "the Monster" that has resulted from his imprisonment, Oh Dae-Su remains in a weakened state, relying on Mi-Do, a sign of the remnants of his crisis of masculinity.  

What is the significance of a film like "Old Boy" being produced in 2003?  Cho and Chung's analyses of "The Stray Bullet" rely on a specific historical context: the postcolonial era following the split between North and South Korea.  "Old Boy" was made almost forty years later though many of the same themes and issues persist.  What does this suggest about South Korean cinema, the mindset engendered by early postcolonial cinema, and the cultural paradigms that persist despite an increasingly globalized world?