Part one
The film tells the story of a male college student (Cha Tar- Hyun) and a girl (Jun Ji-Hyun) whose name is never given (in the movie) and will be referred to as the Girl below. Our male protagonist, Gyeon-woo, cannot seem to catch a break. His romantic prospects are so pathetic that even his mother tries to help out, telling him to go visit his aunt so she can introduce him to this girl she knows. Gyeon-woo has more pride than that so he refuses, despite his mother's insistence that he just go and visit his aunt since his cousin, her son, recently passed away and she always thought they were very alike. After a night out with his friends, he heads to the train station to catch a ride home. There he sees the Girl, stone drunk and 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, who he is slightly attracted to but repulsed by her drunkenness. Finally, she throws up on an old man, calls Gyeon-woo "honey" and faints. The old man chides him and tells him to take care of his girlfriend. Gyeon-woo, confused, carries her all the way to the nearest motel. While he is showering, her phone rings and he runs out to answer it, still naked. He informs the caller of his location, and is soon busted in on by a pair of police officers. A short struggle later, he is taken to jail.
After getting out of jail, he receives a call from the Girl telling him to meet her at a café, where he details the previous night. She seems irritated and drags Gyeon-woo off to a bar, where she gets hammered again, resulting in yet another trip to the same motel.
The Girl has an abrasive and aggressive personality. After this second overnight stay at the motel, she starts to think of ways to get Gyeon-woo out of class to hang out with her. For example, faced with a feisty teacher, she succeeds in getting him out of class by claiming to be on the way to an abortion, with him 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 one of Gyeon-woo's beloved melodramas 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 cliches 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 stick with the Girl. He feels a pain inside her and wants to ease it. So no matter what happens, he bites his tongue and trudges on. 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. But not before a special nighttime trip to the amusement park where the pair encounter an AWOL soldier who holds them hostage and, mistaking them for a real couple, telling them to appreciate each other and the love they have.
Cha Tae-hyun gives Jeon Ji-hyun a ride
Part two
The second - and the more dramatic- half of the movie begins with the Girl waiting for Gyeon-woo after school. She takes him out to the park and suddenly complains about the pain her high heels are causing her. In the subsequent conversation, she convinces Gyeon-woo to switch shoes with her. Overjoyed, she tells him to chase her around the park and which he does until it starts raining. They walk to her house where Gyeon-woo meets her parents, after which he overhears a massive argument between the Girl and her mother over her relationship with him. Gyeon-woo does not hear from her for a long time.
For their 100th-day anniversary, she calls him and asks him to bring her a rose during class. He does this, leading to a touching and romantic scene where he follows the beautiful melody of Canon in D of Pachelbel to where she is, which is onstage at a piano concert in front of a audience of hundreds. But the night unfolds further and again he is faced with her parents, the Girl herself unconscious for the third time. Her father, infuriated, arranges a break-up. At this point, Gyeon-woo realizes how special the Girl is. He is unwilling to let her go.
The Girl asks Gyeon-woo to meet her for dinner, but 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 the date by themselves. Gyeon-woo is broken hearted over the loss of the girl, but his love compels him to ensure her happiness. He instructs the other guy to follow 10 rules to make the Girl happy. Some of these are humorous ("Do not let her drink more than 3 drinks", "Be prepared to spend time in prison") but others are very sentimental. Unbeknownst to Gyeon-woo, the Girl hears these 10 rules and rushes to find him.
She asks him to write a letter and bring it with him. There, she unveils a time capsule where their letters will go inside and be buried next to a tree on a mountain for two years. In two years, they shall meet again to read the letters. Having established that she does not intend for them to see each other again until that two years is up, they separate and go their own ways.
Gyeon-woo finds himself on the mountain two years later but the Girl does not show. Depressed, he opens the time capsule and is startled when a frog jumps out of it. He proceeds to read the letter and learns the root of her angst and behavior. The Girl had a boyfriend who she was madly in love with and who did everything she ever wanted and more. Like Gyeon-woo, he brought her a rose on their 100th day and like Gyeon-woo, met her on the train. She was happy and content, planning their lives together under that very tree and taking long walks in the sunset next to the lake. His sudden death left her heartbroken. In remembrance of the tragic event, she and his mother make a trip each year to the lake where he drowned. She also says that her deceased boyfriend's mother has been encouraging her to move on with her life and even tried to introduce guys to her but she wasn't ready.
Time passed without her feeling any better, still tortured by her lost love. Meeting Gyeon-woo only made her feel worse because he reminded her of her lost love and he treated her just as well which made her develop feelings for him (which caused conflicts within herself, as she was still mourning for her deceased boyfriend). She finally decided that she needed to get away in order for her to complete her mourning and move on, and that if she and Gyeong-woo are really meant to be together, fate shall bring them back together.
Gyeon-woo tries to figure out the Girl.
One year after Gyeon-woo visits the tree, the Girl finally comes. Sitting under the tree is an old man. Throughout their conversation, the old man is very interested in finding out why the Girl was one year late.(1) After the old man tells the Girl the touching story how the tree was struck down by lightening only to have another tree planted in its place by a young man who said there was someone who would be very sad to find that the tree had been destroyed, the old man disappears and the Girl looks at the sky to see a tiny UFO flying across the sky and then vanishing.(2)
In the final scene, Gyeon-woo finally has agreed to visit his aunt and meet this girl that his aunt has been talking about and she turns out to be none other than the Girl. The Girl's deceased boyfriend's mother is actually Gyeon-Woo's aunt. The movie ends with them out clubbing together, implying that they have moved past their issues and are a happy couple now.
(1) It is implied in the movie that old man is the Gyeon-woo from the future. Some speculation on why the future Gyeon-woo wants to find out why the Girl was one year late: The Girl and Gyeon-woo got married in the end, but the Girl still refuses to tell him why she was one year late. Or, the Girl broke up with Gyeon-woo again and he never found out why she was one year late. Throughout the movie, the relationship between Gyeon-woo and the Girl is an on-off bittersweet affair.
(2) The Girl had mentioned a few times that she wished to meet someone from the future. Her wish is granted by the old Gyeon-Woo (the old man under the tree) from the future. After her encounter with the UFO, she proceeds to the place where her ex-boyfriend died from drowning. In a deleted scene from the director's cut, she throws the necklace into the sea. This symbolizes that she finally has closure.
"My Sassy Girl" is based on an on-line serial written by Kim Ho-sik that detailed his relationship with his off-the-wall college girlfriend. This was eventually compiled into a best-selling book and caught the attention of director Kwak Jae-young, who wrote the script for the film. The story kicks off with college student Kyun-woo (Korean pop singer Cha Tae-hyun, in his feature film debut) crossing paths with a drunk girl (Jun Ji-hyun of "Il Mare") on a late-night subway. Just before she passes out, the girl looks at Kyun-woo and calls him 'honey'. The other passengers, assuming him to be the hapless girl's boyfriend, demand that Kyun-woo look after her. After carrying her on his back for what seems to be miles, Kyun-woo drops the girl off at a motel. But instead of leaving her and getting on his way, Kyun-woo finds himself intrigued by the nameless girl and vows to do whatever he can to heal her sorrow.
Unfortunately, he gets far more than he bargained as he becomes wrapped around the finger of this strange girl, whose dramatic mood swings are outmatched only by her penchant for sociopathic behavior. When they dine out and Kyung-woo orders anything but coffee, she barks her mantra "Do you wanna die?" and then promptly changes his order to coffee. When her feet begin aching from walking, she forces Kyung-woo to switch his comfortable running shoes for her high heels. And being a budding screenwriter, she demands that Kyung-woo read her wacky treatments, or else face an ass kicking. However, despite these crazy antics (not to mention landing in jail a few times), Kyun-woo finds himself hopelessly hooked on this 'sassy girl'. And though the girl seems to relish in humiliating and belittling those around her, it becomes clear that underneath the brash exterior is a wounded soul who holds a genuine affection for Kyun-woo.
This cleverly scripted comedy covers a lot of territory in its two-hour running time, containing enough material for at least two movies. The film's first half (a fact that is irreverently highlighted with a big bold pastel-colored title) deals with Kyung-woo's initial misadventures with the 'sassy girl' and the absurdity he faces in her company. In addition to the obvious comic set-pieces revolving around the girl's anti-social tendencies, Kwak has some fun visualizing her female-centered film treatments, such as "Terminator Demolitionist", featuring a female warrior from the future gunning down bad guys à la "The Matrix". Another great gag has Kyung-woo being instructed to drop off her treatment at Shin Cine (the production company behind "My Sassy Girl") and making the suggestion that Han Suk-yu and Shim Eun-ha be cast in the lead roles (for the uninitiated, they are two top Korean box office draws who appeared together in "Christmas in August" and "Tell Me Something").
However, as the film moves into its second half (declared with more pastel-colored lettering) and even overtime (check), the bottled-up emotions and vulnerable side of the 'sassy girl' start to reveal themselves, and the film moves into more melodramatic territory, reflecting the growing maturity of the two lead characters. The film even takes a riff from the ever-popular 'love across time' genre (which includes "Ditto", "Failan", and "Il Mare") as the would-be lovers spend some time apart and are reunited by an unexpected and clever plot twist. Despite the more serious mood of this latter half, Kwak manages to avoid the melancholic overkill that permeates the typical Korean romance, while still providing a good enough emotional footing for the story.
If there is one really good reason to watch "My Sassy Girl", it would have to be Jun Ji-hyun's turn as the film's unnamed heroine. From her unforgettable first appearance as a wasted commuter, to her rambunctious bullying of Kyun-woo, to the heartbreak she wears on her sleeve, Jun displays an unparalleled level of enthusiasm and dramatic range in portraying a young woman whose domineering exterior is but a smokescreen for her own vulnerability-- it is almost difficult to believe that this same actress who played the quiet and introspective Kim Eun-ju in "Il Mare". As her opposite, the likable Cha Tae-hyun is the perfect comic foil/underdog for Jun's bundle of untamed energy, and his 'constipated' facial expression, when faced with one of her 'outbursts', is priceless.
Like the best Korean films, "My Sassy Girl" is a genre-bending exercise that throws in elements of the teen comedy, the traditional melodramatic romance, and even some genre parody and blends them into a unique cinematic experience that defies categorization. The film's original Korean title, Yeopgi, which means 'novelty-seeking', is in reference to the youth craze that was started by Kim Ho-sik's original Internet postings about his eccentric girlfriend. Though the English title for this film doesn't mean quite the same thing, it certainly does tell you what to expect.
