If you know a thing about first love stories, it's either it doesn't work out in the end or it's a till death do us part" affair. The same goes for this movie, one with the storyline focused on a first love story, how it ends is one you should look forward to if you decide to see this movie.
Just after I had finished seeing "Strong Girl Nam-soon", and was intrigued by the supporting character Ru Shi-oh starred by Byeon Woo-seok, I went on a search for other series where he starred in and I came across this short movie.
For one who would always prefer series, I didn't give it a second thought to see this short movie at least for a break from too many series and it turned out to be another good watch for me.
The 20th Century Girl is a two hour Korean movie released in the year 2022 but it's scenes are set in a year before the 21st century (1999-2000). The movie is starred by popular characters like Kim Yoo-jung from the most recent series "My Demon" and Byeon Woo-seok from "Strong Girl Nam-soon" as I've pointed out before. These two are good casts and play their role really well so I didn't expect anything less in this movie even if it was just for two hours.
The storyline of this short movie goes like this...
In 1999 lived a school girl whose friend is out of the country for a heart surgery. Before leaving, her friend asks her to find out whatever about a boy she fell in love with. Na Bora begins to follow the boy around who happened to always be around his best friend, it turns out the two girl friends mistook the names of the boys and Bora was following the wrong boy around.
Na Bora falls in love with the Poong Woo, who she supposed was a friend of the guy her friend is in love with. Things took a great turn when her friend returned from her successful heart surgery and both have to choose between their first love or friendship love.
What really caused the mistake with the boys name that brought this upon two best friends? How did it end with their first love? You'll have to check out the movie to find out.
If there's one thing I felt so much while seeing this movie, it was the feeling of sadness towards the young lives falling in love and the older ones setting a bridge they can't fight off. This isn't so necessary as I think they just wanted to show how first love is but I wish the movie had ended a bit more different. Then again, the end was what made the movie make a whole lot of sense and I don't regret seeing it.
I actually saw the movie again before this review, so yeah, it's a movie one could see over and over and you'll still feel the emotions it brought to you on your first watch. The supporting characters didn't do much and I didn't think much about them as our main characters played their role too well.
The scenes where they cried, shared past memories and even where the male lead revealed his true feelings towards the female lead, all those scenes were so memorable and I like the mild comedy in it, too much comedy wouldn't have been cool for such a movie anyways.
I'll recommend this short movie to anyone who likes romantic movies but I must say, there are a lot of lessons shared in this movie than it being romantic. I especially like the setting of the scenes as they try to show how it was back in the beginning of the 21st century.
It's a 8/10 from me on this one and that's because I wished for a much better ending. Aside that, the movie is definitely going to be worth your time. What do you think about the storyline?