My Sassy Girl

Watch the Korean version first. This version will just act as a spoiler. This is Hollywood just taking the short cut. Look at what is huge in other countries and ripping it off. I was fortunate enough to see the Korean version first, if I hadn't this would have lessened the impact.

The acting was only OK. A lot of the emotion was zapped out of the story. In the Korean version the Sassy girl was played and presented better. You knew there was something intriguing about the girl. She seemed emotionally hurt. In this version she seemed more psychotic, She just seemed to attack.

This movie is an American adaptation of the Korean version of the same name. Cuthbert and Bradford both fail to recreate the integral chemistry of the characters from the original version. In comparison to Jun Ji-hyun's portrayal of the "sassy girl", Cuthbert's performance was uninspired and often times painful to watch. Jun Ji-hyun's organic performance of a lively yet complex girl becomes forced and unconvincing in Cuthbert's attempt. One is awkwardly aware throughout the film that Cuthbert is trying to mimic a character rather than becoming the character herself. Besides Bradford's "good boy" image, he contributes nothing to the role. He lacks the emotion and passion of the original character. As for the movie, it is a scene by scene copy of the original version, each more poorly executed than the next. Rather than a cute romantic comedy created by the natural interactions of the characters, this movie feels fake, choppy, and poorly made for budgeted movie. If you're going to watch both versions, make sure you see this one first before the original. To do the opposite would be akin to reading the book and then seeing the adapted movie.

(Spoilers) So, we have a film about a woman who can't let go of her first love, whom she obviously idealized. She subsequently struggles to accept a new suitor for what he is in his own terms. Instead, she wants him to magically become the old guy. It's more than ironic that so many of the critiques of this film do exactly that—fail to judge it on its own terms. So maybe your former lover really was superior, maybe Jordan's ex was better than Charlie, and, yes, maybe the original Korean version of this film was better than the American remake. I can accept that. But judge this film on its own terms, please.

The way the plot unfolds – without my spoilers – allows the oddities of its characters to go unexplained until near the end. In retrospect I found Jordan's character and behavior quite plausible. Similarly, Charlie is a bit two-dimensional at first, but then what do you expect from French Lick, Indiana – an artsy guy like Larry Bird? The guy's ambition is to go into corporate agricultural, after all. There really are people like that. This mysterious girl lures him into something more alive, to use his term. She gains depth in retrospect, once we understand her, and he gains depth because of her.

The plot is simply instinctive love exerting a force that carries two young lovers through well-placed doubts and formidable emotional perils. Not terribly original—perhaps even trite, but I liked it. Restrained as I once was by dull ideals, I strongly identified with Charlie's simultaneous resistance and compulsive attraction to this vector- deficient girl who takes over his life. Several times I told him to run fast and far. Yet, although I couldn't understand why, instinct told us to stay.

Based on the alleged quality of the original film, this remake of My Sassy Girl probably could have been a masterpiece, but this film is just fine in its own right. I take issue with much of what Hollywood does, including falling short in remakes, bringing every film to a cliché ending, and grossly overstating the presumed wealth of most characters – none of my physician friends live in anything near the multi-floor Manhattan mansion that the doctor, maybe 15 years out of med school – inhabits. With all its flaws, however, My Sassy Girl pleasantly filled an evening and made me smile.

I must admit when I first heard they were making an American remake of My Sassy Girl my stomach kinda churned. I wasn't sure that Hollywood could recreate the amazing korean film from 2001. Now there's good news and bad news... let's start with the good.

I like how they added a bit more playfulness to the movie giving it strange cut-scenes in between the main story. This added to the fun factor of the movie, but some may see it as just a simple waste of time. Using New York as the place setting for this film seemed typical but executed decently. And using one of the most recognizable cities in the world helped users become semi-comfortable. Both leading actors do a decent job, nothing too overly noticeable but decent.

Now the bad news, though the actors did a decent acting job.. you could still tell they're acting. When an actor feels his role and becomes the character the more enjoyable a film can be. For example Heath Ledger as The Joker in The Dark Knight, he did an amazing job. I wish the actors did the same, but to be honest it seemed to be stale at times.

Overall the movie is 1/2 bad. As a stand alone rom/com it does a pretty decent job. But for the hardcore fans it's really obvious that this movie will just never be as good as the original. It's definitely worth watching once, that way you can develop your own idea on this film. They did an OK job trying to port the movie, a lot of things were lost in translation and unfortunately with that happening it simply makes the movie OK.

Yann Samuell's version of 'My Sassy Girl' is pretty much 95% a scene by scene copy of the beautiful Korean film. The hackneyed plot really lacks soul. It's not as bad as the trashy Indian version called 'Ugly Aur Pagli'. The friend character in this American version is annoying and one of the many Hollywood clichés including the Hollywood ending. The Americanized rewriting also makes the characters clichéd. For example the sequences of Charlie's and his friends discussion about relationships is something we have witnessed in numerous sitcoms and movies. No marks for creativity. Jesse Bradford tries to make the best of Charlie (despite the poor writing). Charlie comes across as whiny but remains tolerable because Bradford manages to make some of him likable. Elisha Cuthbert has never looked better but she fails to deliver in the comedic scenes. She's better during the more intense moments.

I loved Jae-young Kwak's 'Yeopgijeogin Geunyeo' which is one of my favourite romantic movies. So I was curious about this remake more so because I liked Bradford in his other movies and Cuthbert is quite pretty. This movie is no match for the original but it's not absolutely terrible (like the Indian one). Watch Kwak's movie if you haven't seen it yet and then give this one a try if you really want to.