Review: Broker

Broker
Cert: 12A / 129 mins / Dir. Hirokazu Koreeda / Trailer

Snobbish though it may undoubtedly be, there is an accepted feeling - in provincial multiplexes as much as the cosmopolitan arthouse - that foreign-language films attract a better class of viewer; more thoughtful, more considerate, quite frankly there to appreciate The Form rather than turning up for car chases and loud bangs.

It also appears that this memo hadn't got as far as the young student-looking chap three seats away from me, who spent the first hour of this film munching his way through a takeaway-boxed 12" pizza and had to get his phone out midway through to reject an incoming call because he hadn't put it on flight mode. As it turns out, the first of these transgressions was probably the culinary equivalent of a Rocky Horror singalong screening, but more on that as we go...

And so to Broker, a South Korean drama from a Japanese director about the black market trade in abandoned babies. When Moon So-young (Lee Ji-eun) leaves her infant child in the 'baby box' of a city church, she returns the next day with a change of heart only to find her young son has been abducted by orphanage worker Dong-soo (Gang Dong-won), who has teamed up with local launderette owner Ha Sang-hyeon (Song Kang-ho), the pair of whom steal newborns left at the church and sell them on to wealthy clients who cannot legally adopt. She confronts the pair and they convince her to be part of their enterprise, splitting the money as a result*¹. They are, however, being watched and trailed by a pair of police detectives (Bae Doona, Lee Joo-young), who are determined to catch them in the act of transaction and put an end to the enterprise. As their collective road-trip progresses, each of the protagonists reflects on their place in a system which allows this to happen.

SOCIETY

Also, it's nowhere near as bleak as that summary suggests. Amazingly. At its heart, Broker is a film about abandonment and a society where it's not exactly approved of, but certainly accepted. There's little actual judgement about the existence of the baby boxes, but they're never treated glibly or taken for granted. The film is about what that does to people when it's so commonplace, and what good can be found in it. But for all the introspection there's also crime, no small amount of intrigue and even a little light farce in here. I can't even imagine how an English-language version of this film would be presented (which it no doubt will, if this is successful). A Vince-Vaughn comedy? A Paul Dano melodrama? Certainly not with the lightness-of-touch in this telling.

Koreeda's direction is languorous, happy to take its time but never drawn out, with lingering character-shots adding to the overall ambience and giving the story (and the audience) space to breathe. The film looks gorgeous, set in run-down urban environments throughout but never framed as squalor, and there's a real tranquility to Hong Kyung-pyo's cinematography. Choi Tae-young's sound design is also very intimate. Too intimate, in fact. A lot of characters in this film spend incidental time eating and drinking, and the up-close audiography means you hear every slurp, chew and clack while they speak with their mouths full. Sufferers of misophonia may want to watch Broker at home where they can turn the volume down to manageable levels (hey, you're reading subtitles anyway).

SHOCKER

All of the central characters are well-defined, and Koreeda spins the plates of distributing meaningful screen-time among them with real skill. But there's a price to be paid for this cinematic rumination, and that's a third act where the pace noticeably sags when it really feels like events should be accelerating to a head. As a result, the story's end seems sketched-in, almost rushed in an effort to wrap things up. Outside of perhaps the oddness of the central premise*², the unflinching humanity of the story means it translates well for international distribution. It should go without saying that this is a slightly odd film, but if you're aware of that on the way in you'll have an easier ride.

Broker is beautifully filmed, exquisitely performed and gorgeously soundtracked. It's also too slow, too long and too scattershot in its storytelling. But slip a pizza out of your backpack and you'll have a great time...

*¹ Initially this is going to be one million South Korean Won, but increases to four million as the script progresses. This sounds like quite a formidable sum of course, until a quick search afterward tells you that 4 million won is roughly £2,500. Which doesn't feel like a lot for an actual human, somehow. Even a small one. Obviously there are differences in the structure of the economy etc, but still. Of the many issues this film raises, the apparent cheapness of buying miniature people isn't one of them... ^{[ BACK ]}

*² Not going to lie, I did have to Google and see if Baby-Boxes (literally the equivalent of leaving a baby on the church steps in classic literature) are a real thing in South Korea in the present day. They are. But it's not just an Eastern or developing-countries thing, they have them in Germany and the USA, too. Like, currently. Obviously it's good that they exist, but it's fairly mortifying that they need to. Probably best not to dwell on that, I suppose. ^{[ BACK ]}

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