Secret Garden Drama Review

One of the best promotional posters ever.

Gil Ra Im(Ha Ji-Won) is an extremely poor stunt woman with no surviving family. Her mother died when she was young and her father was a firefighter who died while saving people from an elevator. Kim Joo Won(Hyun Bin) is the arrogant CEO of a huge shopping district. He lives what seems to be a perfect life but he has a small memory lapse from when he was in an accident involving an elevator which resulted in an extreme case of claustrophobia. When Joo Won is asked to pick up a girl for his super star cousin, Oska, he accidentally mistakes Ra Im as the actress and takes her instead. When Ra Im figures out that she's not who Joo Won was supposed to take the two race back to find the real actress before she reviles the scandalizes pictures she has of her and Oska. After that crisis is averted, Joo Won spots Ra Im practicing a scene for the movie and instantly falls in love with her, though he'd never admit it to himself or anyone else. This incurs a hilarious few scenes where Joo Won is trying to live his life but a hallucination of Ra Im keeps popping up and following him around. It gets to the point where he even starts talking to the hallucination and wonders if he's going crazy. When Joo Won accidentally sends Oska and Ra Im, who has a huge crush on Oska, on a romantic getaway for an upcoming music video he's making Joo Won freaks out and follows them there, determined to keep the two apart. This results in Joo Won and Ra Im getting lost in the forest and stumbling on a small secluded restaurant called the Secret Garden. The two end up drinking some magical alcohol which makes them switch bodies. YES!

Review: And here is where Hyun Bin really shines. He's super funny before the body swap but after I just died. Who knew such a hot guy could play a girl so well? Ha Ji-Won does a great job too but for some reason it isn't as funny to watch a girl acting like a boy as it is to watch a boy acting like a girl. The plot didn't make a whole lot of sense, if you really think about it, but I try not to and rather think about how funny this drama was. If you go to sleep one day as a man and wake up the next day as a woman, and visa versa, you'd probably freak out. Hyun Bin and Ha Ji-Won do a fantastic job at capturing this perfectly. The only problem I detected was that they made Ra Im a little tomboyish so when Hyun Bin's was trying to act like a girl, he was more girly than she was. The same with Joo Won, he was a little feminine and when Ha Ji-Won was acting like a boy she was a little too masculine for his character. But I still loved the drama so it didn't bother me too much.
In some dramas I'm worried about the second lead male and second lead female; I usually get worried that they'll come between the lead male and lead female but I didn't worry at all in this drama. The whole time I knew the leads were just using the seconds to make the other jealous so I didn't grow to hate them as I usually do.
All in all, a pretty good drama. If anything, you need to watch it to see Hyun Bin pretend to be a girl and to see his act like a 21 year-old boy. Pretty darn funny.
Rating: 8.5/10 (for plot flaws)

Memorable Moment: Episode 19-
Joo Won has finally recovered his lost memory from when he was 21 and this is the story that he tells us.
A building is on fire and just as the fire crew has brought out the remaining survivor when they get word that there is still someone stuck in the elevator. Gil Ra Im's father rushes into the building to save the man only to find him with a hurt leg and unable to crawl out of the broken elevator.

Firefighter Gil hops down into the elevator and tries to figure out a way to escape while attempting to calm the nervous Joo Won.

As the two get up and start to climb to the elevator door, the cable slips and drops them further down the shaft. Firefighter Gil freezes, recognizing that if they move the elevator could slip even further and maybe kill them both. He radios for help then pries the elevator door open with his axe.

Hoisting Joo Won onto his shoulders, Firefighter Gil tells him that once they get out of here, he'll introducing him to his daughter Ra Im. "You'll faint at how pretty she is." After Joo Won climbs out of the elevator he offers his hand to Firefighter Gil to pull him out. The elevator shutters. The two freeze. Firefighter Gil's face changes as he realizes he won't make it out alive. Joo Won too seems to realize this and tells him to take his hand a little more urgently. Firefighter Gil takes a step closer to Joo Won and the elevator shakes even harder. Now he knows that he's not going to make it out alive and slowly he releases Joo Won's hand. Joo Won looks at their grasped hands then into Firefighter Gil's eyes and softly shakes his head, not wanting the man who saved his life to die.

He tells Firefighter Gil: "You can't. Don't Let go. You can't."Firefighter Gil continues to slowly release his hand, so no sudden movement shakes the elevator even more, while telling him: "Let go. If you don't, we're both going to fall. Let go and run to the right." Joo Won refuses to let go and tells him that he won't. "Take my hand. Hurry and take it." But Firefighter Gil has accepted his fate and urges Joo Won to leave: "Hurry and go. Go and tell my daughter that I'm sorry I couldn't get home early. Tell her I love her. That her father loves her very much. Tell her that for me." To the very end Joo Won is still pleading for Firefighter Gil to take his hand, still refusing to let him die. The elevator gives another massive shake and Firefighter Gil grasps Joo Won's hand firmly. "I'm begging you..." he tells him softly. Joo Won keeps shaking his head and begging but Firefighter Gil pushes him away from the opening and the elevator's cable finally gives and Joo Won screams while watching Firefighter Gil's face disappear as the elevator plunges down and bursts into flames.

This scene almost made me cry. Not because it was touching, well that was part of it, but because of firefighters who would do what Ra Im's father did in this situation. This scene could actually happen in real life and that's what made me remember it.