Broker 2022 kmovie review

It has been a long time since I have watched a Korean movie but Broker is no ordinary Korean movie. It was directed by Koreeda Hirokazu one of Japan's greatest directors who did Shoplifters, Dare mo Shiranai etc. Shoplifters or Manbiki Kazoku is one of my favourite Japanese movies ever. I could rewatch it every year. 

While Shoplifters was about a family living in poverty trying to survive, Broker is about two friends, a laundry worker played by Song Kang-Ho and a part timer who works for a church that has a baby box for mothers to leave their unwanted babies.

Their gig is to erase the surveillance video when a baby is put in the box and sell the baby on the black market. On day a very young mother puts her baby in front of the box during a rainy day with a note saying that she will be back for the baby. A policewoman who has been tailing our brokers puts the baby in the box. The next day the young mother comes back asking for her baby back and the brokers are forced to let her into their plan to sell their baby.

I enjoyed Broker because it asks a lot of questions about people giving babies as it is not something we normally and whether its better to abort or give birth and give them out. Broker looks at orphans who cannot escape the feeling that they are discarded. 

There is this interesting dichotomy between the cops who want the baby to be sold so that they can catch the brokers in the act and the brokers who actually want to do what's right for the baby.

I don't think Koreeda intended to do this but he has recreated the Shoplifters and replaced shoplifting with selling babies. He has created another show about people on the fringe coming together as a family and the beats are so similar. I am not complaining because it is a great formula and I enjoy his movies because he explores characters who don't normally main characters in cinemas and doramas.

Broker is not as good as Shoplifters. The pacing is a bit slow and should have had more humour but it has heart and that is most important. Very watchable and available in the high seas.