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South Korean superstar Bae Doona plays Hyun-chae, a cashier girl, whose quirky personality drives most guys away.

Hyun-chae desperately wants a man in her life and that is her goal in Spring Bears Love. Her co-workers make fun of her lack of being in a relationship status. So while eating lunch one day, outside the grocery store she works at, sitting on a bench with her friend, Miran, she talks about her last date and conventionally leaves out all her bad habits. She went to a movie with a guy is what she tells Miran as the viewer sees her slurping loudly on her soda straw, chewing a noisy dried squid, and laughing at the stupid antics of the characters in the movie she is watching. Her male friend is quiet and just wants to see the movie in peace but that is not likely to happen as Hyun-chae slaps his arm and talks to him. He is far too uptight for her. Naturally she comes off as a being on her best behavior to Miran, who is only getting half the story.

As Hyun-chae dates different men with little to no success, she starts checking out big, heavy art books from her local library. The books all contain love messages from a mysterious admirer named Vincent. Hyun-chae spends her time trying to take care of her eccentric father, who is a writer, working a boring job, and trying to figure out who Vincent really is. This pursuit of Vincent quickly takes over Hyun-chae’s life and she becomes obsessive.

It gets so bad that she doesn’t see what is going on around her.
This is one local train operator, Dong-ha, who pursues Hyun-chae, as she is pursuing Vincent. They go out together to eat Whoppers at Burger King. Hyun-chae watches in horror as Dong-ha eats his Whopper taking big bites as globs of ketchup spray out. She doesn’t seem to realize that her movie habits are just as bad. Sometimes the right person for you is right there in front of your face and sometimes you don’t see it because you are engaged in some foolish quest.
Dong-ha puts up with all of Hyun-chae’s weird habits and even stands up to her critical sharp tongue that takes little cuts at him. He is too far in love for everything to stand in his way even when the object of his desire doesn’t seem to care.

Spring Bears Love is a strange love story showing off how entertaining Bae Doona can be. She isn’t super sexy but cute in that girl-next-door look and that make her accessible to a wider audience.



Although Spring Bears Love flopped in Korea, it still has some interesting scenes and a cool K-pop soundtrack so it is still worth a look. I wouldn’t consider it a total failure. If Bae Doona wasn’t in it, it would be average with anyone else.

Fans of Japanese horror movies might recognize Bae Doona from the Korean remake of The Ring called The Ring Virus. She also had an interesting role in The Host. The future looks bright for Bae Donna as she just had her Hollywood debut in Cloud Atlas (2012.) It will be interesting to see if she can begin and sustain a career in Hollywood that is less than kind to Asian superstars.

3 out of 5 Stars

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"The Asian Aperture" is ©2012 by Jason Fetters. All contents of Crazed Fanboy are ©2012 by Nolan B. Canova and Terence Nuzum.

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