My Sassy Girl

My Sassy Girl (엽기적인 그녀; literally, That Bizarre Girl) is a 2001 South Korean romantic comedy film. It is partially based on the true story told in a series of love letters written by Kim Ho-sik, a man who posted them online. The film is directed by Kwak Jae-yong.

The film was extremely successful in South Korea. When My Sassy Girl was released throughout East Asia, it became a mega blockbuster hit in the entire region, from Japan, China, Taiwan, Philippines, Hong Kong, Singapore, Vietnam and Indonesia, to the point where it was drawing comparisons to Titanic. Through positive word-of-mouth, the movie eventually became one of the most popular South Korean films among Asian Americans in the United States.

An American remake, starring Jesse Bradford and Elisha Cuthbert, and directed by Yann Samuell is scheduled to be released in 2007 [1].

Plot

Part one

The film tells the story of a male college student, Gyeon-woo (Cha Tae-Hyun) and the Girl (Jun Ji-hyun) whose name is never given (in the movie). Gyeon-woo just cannot seem to catch a romantic break. His prospects are so pathetic that even his mother tries to help out, telling him to go visit his aunt for two reasons. One, that Gyeon-woo reminds his aunt of her son who drowned not too long ago; two, so his aunt can introduce him to the girl who used to date her son. Gyeon-woo repeatedly puts off going to see his auntie.

One evening, at the train station on his way home, he observes a girl, stone drunk, standing precariously close to the edge of the train platform as the train approaches; he pulls her to safety just in time. Inside the train, Gyeon-woo cannot help but stare at the girl wavering back and forth. He is slightly attracted to her but also repulsed by her drunkenness. Finally, she throws up on a passenger and faints—but not before she calls Gyeon-woo "honey". The old man aggressively chides Gyeon-woo and tells him to take care of his girlfriend. Gyeon-woo, completely flustered, carries her all the way to the nearest motel. While he is showering, her cell phone rings. Stark naked he runs out to answer it and informs the caller of their location. Very soon, just as Gyeon-woo realises there are no towels in the shower, a pair of women police officers burst into the room and he is taken to jail.

After getting out of jail—where he was bullied by gangsters—he goes home. His mother chastises him with a vacuum cleaner for not turning up at his aunty's and there is a brief flashback of his lifetime failings as a student. He receives a call from the Girl demanding he meet her and explain why he was naked in bed with her. The Girl's dominating and demanding tone during the telephone call establishes her typical posture as a xanthippe, an attitude she maintains throughout the film. Both at the takeaway joint and at the bar to which she drags him she tells him to order, criticises his choices and then tells him what to order. Over soju she cries, admits to breaking up with her boyfriend the day before and gets thoroughly drunk, resulting in another trip to the previous motel.

After this second overnight stay at the motel, she begins to become a more active part of his life. She visits Gyeon-woo out in school and manages to get him to hang out with her. In one sitution she obtains permission from a feisty teacher by claiming she needs him to accompany her on the way to an abortion, with Gyeoon-woo being the father. Her mood swings wildly from joyful to downright violent but Gyeon-woo puts up with it and lets her abuse him for her amusement.

She is an aspiring scriptwriter and throughout the movie gives Gyeon-woo three different screenplays from different genres. The first is an action movie—The Demolition Terminator—which switches gender roles, symbolically having the Girl save her helpless lover (Gyeon-woo). The second is a wild perversion of a Korean short story—Sonagi—in which the Girl, having died, asks that her lover be buried along with her—even though he's still alive. The resulting situation is quite humorous. The last is a wuxia/samurai movie spoof full of genre clichés and anachronisms. All three feature the same common thread: the Girl is from the future.

Despite all the horrible things, Gyeon-woo endures; he is determined to help cure the girl's pain. So, no matter what happens, he bites his tongue and trudges on. During one adventure he decides to surprise her for her birthday and takes her on a nighttime trip to the amusement park which ends up quite differently than how he planned: The pair encounter an AWOL soldier who holds them hostage and rants on about his misery and eventually holds Gyeon-woo hostage. Throughout the first half of the movie she is resolute in her pain, dishing it out in plenty. As the second half comes around, however, she begins to change: she shows vulnerability.

Part two

The second—more dramatic—half of the movie begins with the Girl waiting for Gyeon-woo after school. She takes him to a park where she suddenly complains about the pain caused by her high-heels and convinces Gyeon-woo to switch shoes with her. Overjoyed, she tells him to chase her around the park and which he does wearing her high heels. It starts raining and they return to her home. At her house Gyeon-woo overhears an impassioned argument between the girl and her mother over her relationship with him. He does not hear from her for quite some time and his life without her begins.

However, one day she calls him and tells him to bring her a rose during class to commemorate their 100th-day anniversary. He does this, leading to a touching and romantic scene where he arrives incognito and is about to leave the packed auditorium but is led to the front by the beautiful melody of George Winston's variations on Pachelbel's Canon in D. The Girl is onstage playing a piano in front of an audience of her all-female classmates who applaud in approval at his romantic gesture—a similar gesture, the viewer is later informed, was performed by her previous boyfriend. As the night further unfolds he is confronted at her house by her parents. Her father is natually infuriated that she is drunk again and demands a break-up.

Time passes and one day the Girl calls Gyeon-woo to meet her for dinner. When he arrives he is surprised to see her with a date. The Girl introduces Gyeon-woo to him as "her friend." During dinner, the Girl leaves the table briefly, leaving Gyeon-woo and her date by themselves. Gyeon-woo candidly offers advice on how to ensure her happiness by following ten rules. He devised his rules from considerable pain, dedication and devotion to the Girl. When she returns her date begins to explain the rules. It is at this point that she realizes just how well Gyeon-woo understands and cares for her. She abruptly leaves her date and searches for Gyeon-woo. Once reunited the two realise they are at a turning point in their relationship.

They travel to a mountain in the countryside where she unveils a time capsule. During the previous night the couple wrote their true feelings in letters which the Girl says will be buried next to a particular tree on the mountain. They agree to meet again at the tree to read the letters together. After burying the time capsule they go their separate ways.

During the two year span, Gyeon-woo works hard to improve himself in many ways, including writing My Sassy Girl to which someone buys the movie rights, an event about which he eagerly anticipates telling the Girl. When the agreed upon date arrives, he travels to the mountain but the Girl does not show. Eventually, he opens the time capsule and reads her letter and learns the root of her angst and behavior: Gyeon-woo reminds her of her previous boyfriend who, rather than breaking up with her, actually died before she met Gyeon-woo. All through the time the Girl and Gyeon-woo were seeing each other she had been seeing her dead boyfriend's mother who wanted to introduce her to a nice young man but the Girl didn't want that.

One year after Gyeon-woo visits the tree, the Girl finally arrives. Sitting under the tree is an old man. During their conversation the old man reveals both the secret of the tree (it is not the same tree; the tree was struck and killed by lightning a year earlier and a similar tree was planted by a young man so that someone special wasn't sad) and that he has read the letters. The Girl says she had hoped that destiny would bring the couple together during the two years.

More time passes. Gyeon-woo is caught outside the shutting doors of a train, presumably ignorant at first of the Girl's presence on the train but after a few seconds of staring he seems to realise whom it is he sees from behind. As the train pulls out and he runs along but has to give up.

At lunch with her dead boyfriend's mother after a year-and-a-half, the Girl is surprised to hear a familiar voice apologise for his lateness. The mother introduces her nephew Gyeon-woo whom she has been trying to introduce to the Girl for years. The mother/aunty tells the Girl to go out with him, he'll make things easier for her and then tells Gyeon-woo that the Girl can give advice to him about his impending trip to England but Gyeon-woo replies, "I don't have to go now." The pair hold hands under the table and the Girl says she thinks she met a man from the future (Gyeon-woo's future). (The final shot shows the pair in their activity from earlier in the film, dressed in school uniform going into a bar it's unclear whether this is a new instance of their togetherness or simply a memorable recap shot of the united couple.)

Trivia

• One of the scenes shown during the sequence when Gyeon-Woo is reading The Girl's letter shows The Girl in the coffee shop touching her ex-boyfriend's hand and is shown ordering a soda. (Throughout the film, whenever Gyeon-Woo tries to order soda, the Girl changes it to coffee.)
• The owner of the motel, where Gyeon-Woo and the Girl stay at twice, also is a subway operator and the gang leader that Gyeon-Woo encounters in prison. They are actually quintuplets. (News of their birth is shown in an news article hanging at the door of the motel.) Throughout the film you see all five of them.
• The transvestite girl Gyeon-Woo meets when he and The Girl are broken up appears earlier in the film, sitting next to The Girl on the subway scene where The Girl brings the forgotten package to the grandmother.
• On the girl's birthday, Gyeon-Woo sets up a surprise where lights sequentially turn-on as they walk by in the theme park (dream sequence). The lights end up turning on sequentially as Gyeon-Woo and the army deserter pass by.
• The soundtrack used at the wuxia/samurai spoof scene was derived from Ashes of Time.

See also

• List of Korean language films
• Korean cinema
• Korean wave
• List of Korea-related topics

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