On a rainy night in Busan, So-young (Lee ‘IU’ Ji-eun) leaves her baby Woo-sung outside a ‘baby box’, a safe place set up in Korean churches for new mothers to leave unwanted infants. Instead, he’s picked up by Sang-hyun (Parasite's Song Kang-ho) who runs an unofficial adoption brokerage and plans to find him a new home. So-young tracks down both Sang-hyun and his business partner Dong-soo (Gang Dong-won) and decides to join their pursuit (alongside a seven-year-old stowaway from a nearby orphanage), but as they search for Woo-sung’s new family, the unlikely group evolves into something of a family themselves – unaware they’re being tailed by two detectives (Doona Bae, Lee Joo-young) who are determined to stop them. Heartwarming, funny and moving, Broker is the outstanding new film from Hirokazu Koreeda, the acclaimed director of Shoplifters.

The Garden Cinema View: Broker contains many classic Koreeda motifs (abandoned children; an unorthodox family unit; impossible ethical decisions; mouth-watering eating scenes; rain; languorous shots of distant trains) but feels like a significant departure from his work in Japan. Perhaps this is his reaction to the Korean landscape or maybe the star effect of working with Korean stars like of Song Kang-ho and Doona Bae, but Broker is surprisingly dramatic (cops and gangsters!), and also more broadly humorous than even the likes of After Life or Shoplifters.

The road trip/caper narrative is full of levity and the 'family' dynamic touchingly well observed. Whilst the ending feels a touch saccharine, it is preceded by several outstanding scenes of real pathos.

Cast:
Song Kang-ho, Gang Dong-won, Bae Doona, IU