Coin Locker Girl

A baby is found in a coin locker at a station. A woman takes it. Il-young grows up with her. The home is an attic in Seoul and there are other children there; they all do the same work. The woman lends money, collects debts and sells the organs of those who cannot pay. They call her mother. Il-young is in her twenties. Her mother gives her a task: she is to get close to the son of a man in debt and find the money. The young man is kind to her. For the first time Il-young sees what another life looks like. Han Jun-hee directs; it is his first feature. Kim Hye-soo plays the mother and Kim Go-eun plays Il-young; Um Tae-goo and Park Bo-gum are in the cast. It is a South Korean production. The film screened in Critics' Week at the 2015 Cannes Film Festival. Kim Hye-soo won awards in Korea for the part and the character became one of the roles she is known for. The matter it treats is a chosen family; the group is a criminal organisation and at the same time the only home. The narrative does not make a simple villain of the mother; she protects and uses at the same time. The film uses Seoul's Chinatown and that quarter is a closed world inside the narrative. The narrative does not shy from showing the violence and some scenes are hard. The ending gives no escape and the circle closes. Its limit is structure; the second half runs to type and the ending can be guessed. Who it is for: viewers who like Korean crime films and character driven thrillers. Who it is not for: it is hard, bleak, and the ending bitter.