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LIMITED EDITION THREE-DISC SET: OLDBOY + OLD DAYS + THREE HOURS OF INTERVIEWS

Often cited as one of the best films of the 2000s and possibly the definitive example of extreme Asian cinema, Oldboy is a brutal, lyrical modern classic of the revenge genre.

Based on the Japanese manga of the same name, the film tells the horrific tale of Oh Dae-su (Choi Min-sik), a businessman who is inexplicably kidnapped and imprisoned in a grim hotel room-like cell for 15 years, without knowing his captor or the reason for his incarceration. Eventually released, he learns of his wife’s murder and embarks on a quest for revenge whilst also striking up a romance with a young, attractive sushi chef, Mi-do (Kang Hye-jung). He eventually finds his tormentor, but their final encounter will yield yet more unimaginable horrors...

Directed with immense flair by Park Chan-wook (The Handmaiden) as the second instalment of his Vengeance Trilogy, Oldboy blazed a trail at the 2004 Cannes Film Festival where it was lauded by the President of the Jury, director Quentin Tarantino. The film went on to become a huge international smash, blowing audiences minds with its concoction of filmmaking virtuosity, ingenious plotting, violence and pathos. Now, this masterpiece has been newly mastered in 4K and is presented here in a three-disc set with a massive array of extras including the feature-length documentary Old Days, and three hours of bonus interviews.

THREE-DISC LIMITED EDITION CONTENTS

• Brand new 4K restoration from the original camera negative supervised by director Park Chan-wook
• High Definition Blu-ray (1080p) presentation
• Original 5.1 DTS-HD Master Audio and 2.0 stereo
• Original Korean and English soundtracks
• Music and effects track
• Newly translated, optional English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing for the English soundtrack
• Newly translated English subtitles for the Korean soundtrack
• Audio commentary with director Park Chan-wook
• Audio commentary with Park Chan-wook and cinematographer Jung Jung-hoon
• Audio commentary with Park Chan-wook, and actors Choi Min-sik, Yu Ji-tae, Kang Hye-jung
• Audio commentary by Film critic Shin Hyung-chul
• Audio commentary by Film critic Kim Young-jin
• Old Days: An Oldboy Story, acclaimed feature-length 2016 documentary about Park Chan-wook's masterpiece
• Old Days Interviews: Looking Back on the Days of Oldboy, Over three hours of extensive recently film interviews with the film’s cast and crew
• New introduction to the film by director Park Chan-wook
• Film Critics on Oldboy, featurette with Oh Dong-jin, Lee Dong-jin, Darcy Paquet and Chris Fujiwara
• Filmmakers on Oldboy, featurette with Directors Kim Jee-woon and Ryoo Seung-wan
• Photographer of Time, an interview with stills photographer Han Se-jun
• Autobiography of Oldboy, a three-and-a-half-hour video diary of the making of Oldboy
• Deleted scenes with optional director commentary
• Behind the scenes featurettes
• Extensive cast and crew interviews
• The Making of Oldboy, lengthy two-part featurette on the film’s production
• Le Grand Prix at Cannes, featurette about the film’s success at the 2004 film festival
• “Bring My Love” music video by Starsailor, using clips of the film
• Trailers, teasers and TV spots
• Image gallery
• Double-sided fold-out poster
• Limited edition 100-page hardbound book featuring new writing by Simon Abrams, Kat Ellinger, and original reviews
• Limited edition packaging featuring newly commissioned artwork by Matt Ryan Tobin

BLU-RAY TWO-DISC SPECIAL EDITION: OLDBOY + OLD DAYS

Often cited as one of the best films of the 2000s and possibly the definitive example of extreme Asian cinema, Oldboy is a brutal, lyrical modern classic of the revenge genre.

Based on the Japanese manga of the same name, the film tells the horrific tale of Oh Dae-su (Choi Min-sik), a businessman who is inexplicably kidnapped and imprisoned in a grim hotel room-like cell for 15 years, without knowing his captor or the reason for his incarceration. Eventually released, he learns of his wife’s murder and embarks on a quest for revenge whilst also striking up a romance with a young, attractive sushi chef, Mi-do (Kang Hye-jung). He eventually finds his tormentor, but their final encounter will yield yet more unimaginable horrors...

Directed with immense flair by Park Chan-wook (The Handmaiden) as the second instalment of his Vengeance Trilogy, Oldboy blazed a trail at the 2004 Cannes Film Festival where it was lauded by the President of the Jury, director Quentin Tarantino. The film went on to become a huge international smash, blowing audiences minds with its concoction of filmmaking virtuosity, ingenious plotting, violence and pathos. Now, this masterpiece has been newly mastered in 4K and is presented here in a two-disc set with a wide array of extras, including the feature-length documentary Old Days.

SPECIAL EDITION CONTENTS

• Brand new 4K restoration from the original camera negative supervised by director Park Chan-wook
• High Definition Blu-ray (1080p) presentation
• Original 5.1 DTS-HD Master Audio and 2.0 stereo
• Original Korean and English soundtracks
• Music and effects track
• Newly translated, optional English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing for the English soundtrack
• Newly translated English subtitles for the Korean soundtrack
• Audio commentary with director Park Chan-wook
• Audio commentary with Park Chan-wook and cinematographer Jung Jung-hoon
• Audio commentary with Park Chan-wook, and actors Choi Min-sik, Yu Ji-tae, Kang Hye-jung
• Audio commentary by Film critic Shin Hyung-chul
• Audio commentary by Film critic Kim Young-jin
• Old Days: An Oldboy Story, acclaimed feature-length 2016 documentary about Park Chan-wook's masterpiece
• New introduction to the film by director Park Chan-wook
• Film Critics on Oldboy, featurette with Oh Dong-jin, Lee Dong-jin, Darcy Paquet and Chris Fujiwara
• Filmmakers on Oldboy, featurette with Directors Kim Jee-woon and Ryoo Seung-wan
• Photographer of Time, an interview with stills photographer Han Se-jun
• Autobiography of Oldboy, a three-and-a-half-hour video diary of the making of Oldboy
• Deleted scenes with optional director commentary
• Behind the scenes featurettes
• Extensive cast and crew interviews
• The Making of Oldboy, lengthy two-part featurette on the film’s production
• Le Grand Prix at Cannes, featurette about the film’s success at the 2004 film festival
• “Bring My Love” music video by Starsailor, using clips of the film
• Trailers, teasers and TV spots
• Image gallery
• Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Justin Erickson

FIRST PRESSING ONLY: Fully illustrated collectors’ booklet with full credits and with new writing by Simon Abrams

They replied this to all of Arrow's Oldboy-related Twitter posts. (Plain is the label that released Oldboy in Korea.)

So maybe another Django situation?

Five commentary tracks for one movie and yet no Kevin Smith or Carrot Top?

Seems that a deal could not be made involving some of the bonus elements on the Oldboy bluray. So arrows says to make-up for it "Tell you what, we'll give you Sympathy for Mr.Vengeance and Lady Vengeance and call it a night.

This once 3 disc set is now a 4 disc set.

DISC THREE – SYMPATHY FOR MR. VENGEANCE
• High Definition Blu-ray (1080p) presentation
• Original 5.1 DTS-HD Master Audio and 2.0 stereo
• Newly translated English subtitles
• Audio commentary by director Park Chan-wook and filmmaker Ryoo Seung-wan
• Screaming for Vengeance, Kim Newman on the Vengeance Trilogy and the tradition of revenge films
• Extensive archival making-
of featurettes, behind the scenes featurettes and cast and crew interviews
• Trailers
• Image gallery

DISC FOUR – LADY VENGEANCE
• High Definition Blu-ray (1080p) presentation of two versions of the film, the original theatrical version and the fade to black and white version
• Original 5.1 DTS-HD Master Audio and 2.0 stereo
• Newly translated English subtitles
• Audio commentary by director Park Chan-wook, director of photography Jung Jung-hoon and art director Joh Hwa-seong
• Audio commentary by director Park Chan-wook and actress Lee Yeong-ae
• Audio commentary by academic Richard Peña
• Extensive archival making-of featurettes, behind the scenes featurettes, cast and crew interviews and deleted scenes
• Trailers
• Image gallery

That post also reveals that the 4-disc edition is already 95% sold out

And it looks like they also commissioned several new Oldboy-specific extras, including yet another commentary (because three wouldn't have cut it!)

Not surprisingly, it’s now SOLD OUT at Arrow’s store.

Debating if I should hold onto my Palisades set. Seems like a lot of overlap.

Still available on Amazon UK for GBP 25. I ordered from Canada and it was discounted to GBP 21 at checkout.

Does anyone how these automatic discounts work? Every Blu-ray I have ordered from Amazon UK gets some sort of discount at checkout and there is usually no indication of the discount on the product page.

It's the VAT being subtracted for non-UK buyers

It's about a 17% decrease

Since there isnt much special stuff with the 2 other movies (except making for a nice all-in-1 set), I'm pondering whether it's interesting anymore for me and if I should instead cancel my preorder a d get the 2-discs set (or nothing at all). I was mostly interested by the korean interviews, since the German set already offers an English friendly presentation of the 4k restoration and most of the extras included here (while my older French DVD offered most of those subbed in French). Already having Mr Vengeance and Lady Vengence on BD, and seeing these wont get new presentations, this looks like a lesser deal to me (the 100 pages book is interesting, but many similar Arrow books turned out to be 75% filled with pictures, so I tend now to lessen my expectations).

It’s still claiming a new 4k restoration from the OCN?

I doubt it will be anything different than the 4K Korean IP-sourced restoration used by Plain Archives and in Germany.

Frustratingly, my preferred online retailer (Base) don't even have this listed yet, so I've just had to purchase from Amazon. Bearing in mind the last two limited editions I purchased from there never turned up, I'm cautiously pessimistic.

Now sold out from Amazon UK, still available from Hive and Zavvi

I would think that it would make sense to increase the number of units in the limited edition. After all, we are still two months away from the release date, and the number of films got bumped from 1 to 3 just 24 hours before it sold out

Maybe Arrow are waiting to see first if they're getting lots of cancellations ? Also, it was supposed to be released in a few weeks and is now 2 months away because of the delay.

I'd be very surprised if Arrow managed to licence and prep extras for Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance and Lady Vengeance in the weeks since Oldboy was announced. They were almost certainly already planned to get their own releases down the line and I hope that speeding them up like this hasn't sacrificed them getting a new transfer/restoration.

Will my pre-order at Amazon carry over from the previously planned package to this new set, or do I need to place another order? Is it called something different now?

EDIT-From looking at the product description it seems like it’s still the same item but now with new contents. Which makes me glad I placed an order early.

Calvin wrote: ↑

Thu Jul 25, 2019 6:26 am

I'd be very surprised if Arrow managed to licence and prep extras for Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance and Lady Vengeance in the weeks since Oldboy was announced. They were almost certainly already planned to get their own releases down the line and I hope that speeding them up like this hasn't sacrificed them getting a new transfer/restoration.

I can't see those having been acquired and prepped in the 2 months since Old Boy was announced. They probably got licenced simultaneously and I suppose were planned for individual releases. However, maybe Arrow hoped to get the possibility to newly restore them, weren't able to, and thought "well, in this configuration, we could pack them here instead to compensate".

Limited edition is available again for order at Amazon.co.uk

Caligula wrote: ↑

Wed Sep 11, 2019 2:41 am

Limited edition is available again for order at Amazon.co.uk

...and at Base.com.

Thanks for that timely tip-off!