I've started to watch a lot of Korean movies... to become more familiar with the language and also to get a feel for the culture. I watch them with the subtitles.
The last one I watched was called "My Sassy Girl". I was a bit dubious at first, but decided to wait it out in the name of science and cultural anthropology. And the movie was actually pretty good. It's a love story... but not your typical kind.
The girl is mourning the loss of her love, and the boy is a college student with no goals or ambitions. They meet when he prevents her from being hit by the subway. She is drunk, which disgusts him, but other passengers force him to carry her off the subway. He decides to help her get over her grief. They hang out and he does absolutely anything she says... he orders coke, she tells him to order coffee, at one point she says her high heels are hurting so he should switch shoes with her. He argues, but eventually switches shoes. She smacks him around, makes outrageous demands, and beats him in all forms of competition. She leaves for weeks without a word and then shows up as if nothing happened. He sticks through it all. She asks him to write her a letter; she writes one as well. Then they put them in a time capsule and bury it under a tree. She says, "We'll meet back here in two years and read the letters." He returns in two years and she doesn't show. After three years, she comes to the tree, but he isn't there. An old man sitting at the tree asks if anything looks different. She says no. He tells her that the tree is not the same one. That the old one had been hit by lightning, but a young man had replaced it with one that looked the same... he says he read her letters, he gives her some sage advice. she calls the boy's phone, but it is no longer in service, she looks for him but can't find him. She gets on the subway where she first met him, and as the door closes he runs up... however, she doesn't see him... more awesome stuff happens...
The ending was great. There are not a lot of movies that have good endings. This one definitely had a good one that gently caught me by surprise (which is hard to do, I'm well known for my movie predicting abilities).
I would recommend this movie, but after thinking about it... there might be a lot of cultural things that wouldn't make sense. Small details... for example the 100 day dating anniversary, the mandatory military service for young men, several of the subway scenes, his meeting and interaction with her parents, how he mentions his age and tells her not to talk down to him, the hitting (Koreans do a lot of hitting and punching)...
So I'm gonna tell you the ending... don't read if you plan to watch it...
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Eventually the girl returns from studying in England. At this point we have learned that at the start of the movie she was mourning because her love had died. She goes and visits the mother of the boy who died. The mother says she has been trying to introduce her to her nephew because she thought it would help her heal... the nephew walks in and it is none other than our boy hero... throughout the entire movie the boy's mother keeps telling him to visit his aunt because she wants to hook him up with some girl... he always manages to avoid it. The aunt is shocked that they somehow know each other. The girl talks about how she "met him in the future" (she liked to write and would always force the boy to read her screen plays. they were always about time traveling heroines). So they have had this long relationship together, but now it is as though they are meeting for the first time.
This story was about loss, letting go, loving again, and the kind of love that sticks it out, even when the person does things that aren't lovable. I think I also liked this movie because the characters weren't your classic perfect stereotypes. But had many obvious flaws throughout the movie.
oh man, I just realized how hard this is to describe. there are so many details. I'm not doing it justice... anyway, I enjoyed it.
Koreans love the sad ending style... yet I've found many of the sad endings are bittersweet... somehow containing both sadness and joy. That's how this one ended.
The following pics are in no way related to the movie. They are pictures of the amazing tiger cape my student wore to school today... with matching tiger gloves.
