Falling in love is like catching a virus, according to lonely scientist Gyun (Kim Yoon-seok), but how can you know if your feelings are “real” or just part of a crazy fever dream you won’t even remember as soon as the infection leaves your system? “There are no fake feelings,” lovelorn translator Taek-seon (Bae Doona) counters, which is true, but sometimes people do things they don’t recognise or later understand because they weren’t in their right mind, whether because of the sickness called love or a more literal kind of contagion.
Anyway, this particular virus makes people incredibly happy for the short period time before they die and was developed as part of a project to create an anti-depressant with no side effects. Taek-Seon gets infected after a disastrous date her sister forces her to go on with socially awkward scientist Su-pil (Son Suk-ku). Su-pil is overly attached to the mice in his lab and is still mourning the death of Masako who appeared to him in a dream and told him to make sure her death wasn’t in vain. In retrospect, perhaps these are symptoms of the infection bubbling away in his body as much as they are of his loneliness, but it’s understandable that Taek-seon wasn’t really considering seeing him again only she’s forced into it when her mother and sister invite Taek-seon over to her apartment as a kind of enforced date. The mother and sister’s insistence on Taek-seon meeting someone and getting married is itself a reflection of a patriarchal society in which being unattached is taboo, while Taek-seon’s sister snaps back that translators won’t be needed soon because of AI implying she should find a husband to support her financially.
But then again, though she might claim to be, it does seem that Taek-Seon isn’t all that happy with her life and later confesses to being “always depressed”. She rarely leaves her apartment and lives a dull and unstimulating existence. Infected with the virus, she suddenly becomes sunnier, more confident, and independent, while chasing romance by approaching a childhood crush she seemingly never had the courage to pursue before. Yeon-u (Chang Kiha) is now a car salesman, and Taek-seon now suddenly has the urge to buy a Mini though she’s never actually driven outside the test centre despite having a license. In one sense, yes, it’s Yeon-u she’s after but the car also represents her latent desires for freedom and a more active life.
Nevertheless, the corrupting aspects of the virus are all too present as Taek-seon begins to act in ways she may be embarrassed by if she could remember them once she’s better. Her memories seem to have remade themselves more to her liking. She’s forgotten that Yeon-u wasn’t quite the hero she thought he was in her overly idealised vision of the innocent childhood sweetheart that she never had the courage to pursue. On the run from “evil” scientists from the lab where Su-pil worked, she starts to fall for Gyun, the expert that’s helping her, but who’s to say whether her feelings are just a product of the virus, an attachment born of their relationship as doctor and patient, or something deeper.
For his part, Gyun starts to fall in love with her seemingly before he himself is infected while knowing that she likely won’t remember any of this once she’s been cured. He too is still dealing with the romantic fallout of an improperly ended relationship in which he apparently stepped back because one of his friends liked his girlfriend more. The now-divorced girlfriend seems resentful that he didn’t put up more of a fight for her, and perhaps it’s true that he’s just a romantic coward and it’s a combination of the virus, a sense of responsibility, and the fact that Taek-seon’s natural immunity could hold the key to unlocking his own research that pushes him to try so hard to find a cure for her.
But his research goals are at least altruistic in his desire to find a depression cure without side effects to help people like his brother who took his own life. Dr Seong’s (Moon Sung-keun) lab, however, is entirely focussed on profit and protecting its own reputation. They’re mostly interested in Taek-seon because of her usefulness to them and are prepared to endanger her life if necessary. Even Gyun admits he acted unethically in agreeing to bypass animal testing but otherwise draws the line at anything that puts lives additionally at risk. Taek-seon, meanwhile, later signs over her antibodies so they can be used for free worldwide for the good of all. Even after the fever has cooled, the virus does seem to have made her a happier, more outgoing person who has the courage to pursue her dreams rather than living in lonely defeat. Whether her feelings were ”real” or merely part of her “sickness” and if the distinction really matters either way is up for debate, but that’s not to say she might not catch the love bug again from a less compromised position and actively in the driving seat of her own life.
Trailer (Korean subtitles only)
Windows on Worlds 