Starring: Jun Ji-hyun, Jang Hyuk
Director: Kwak Jae-yong
Category: IIA (Korean)
South Korean director Kwak Jae-yong seems to know his audience. In My Sassy Girl (2001), he captured hearts with an annoying, yet ultimately charming, couple going through their romantic rites of passage to often hilarious effect. In his follow-up, The Classic, he turned the sentimentality valve up to full, and there was nary a dry eye in the house.
Kwak has returned with Windstruck - a tale of love and loss - and, initially, the signs look good. He has again called on the wonderful Jun Ji-hyun (above right) from My Sassy Girl and has brought the promising Jang Hyuk (Volcano High) along to play her love interest.
Things start off brightly. Jun plays a rather intense (and brutal) young police officer who mistakes Jang for a purse thief. Their initial slapstick scenes provide some of the film's highlights - the matter-of-fact police officer and the bumbling, but sweet, man, working the same sort of relationship that made My Sassy Girl so funny.