'Broker' Challenges Us to Be Comfortable With Moral Ambiguity

Two men steal babies from boxes and sell them on the black market in South Korea. When one baby’s mother confronts them, they let her in on the action. Under the direction of a different filmmaker, Broker could have been noir, a thriller, a bloody martial arts affair. But because it was written and directed by Japanese auteur Hirokazu Kore-eda, it contains an element that films by many other directors do not — grace. 

Baby boxes provide places for people to anonymously deposit unwanted infants with no questions asked, and they exist all over the world — in fire stations, hospitals, churches and other buildings. (Here in the U.S., they’re often championed by anti-abortion activists as a solution to unwanted pregnancies.) The baby box in Broker is managed by a church, and, yes, two men intercept infants to sell them on the black market to desperate couples.

But it’s clear by their second scene together that Ha Sang-hyeon (played by Parasite’s Song Kang-ho) and Dong-soo (Gang Dong-won) aren’t monsters. When one baby’s mother, Moon So-young (Lee Ji-eun), shows up at the church the morning after she abandons her child, the brokers don’t conceal the baby from her. They offer to let her in on the cut. What seems like a clear issue — human trafficking is not cute — quickly changes shape. 

Dong-soo is still a young man, himself an orphan. When he visits the orphanage where he grew up, hordes of children greet him like he’s a movie star. But there’s something missing in him, at least in the beginning. At the orphanage, we meet 8-year-old Hae-jin (Im Seung-soo), a bubbly soccer fanatic who, orphanage employees say when he’s out of earshot, is far past adoption age. There are more children than will ever be adopted. But adopters only want newborns and are stymied by a long bureaucratic process that leaves them willing to pay for a child on the black market.

Ha Sang-hyeon, Dong-soo, Moon So-young and baby Woo-sung are joined by the mischievous Hae-jin, and the five become an unlikely family — similar to the circumstances of Kore-eda’s nearly perfect 2018 Palme d’Or winner Shoplifters — as they meet couples who want to buy the baby. There are plenty of laughs — often at the expense of Ha Sang-hyeon, who never seems to mind. In the background, the context of Moon So-young’s decision plays out. 

Song Kang-ho is among the greatest actors of his generation. As in Parasite, he is Broker’s patriarch, albeit a de facto one. He dotes upon Woo-sung with Big Dad Energy, clumsily but tenderly preparing the baby’s meals, dressing him in mismatched outfits and toting him from place to place in a carrier haphazardly strapped to his chest. As is often the case with Song Kang-ho’s characters, there is a lot more here than meets the eye. 

Throughout the journey, two cops — Soo-jin (Bae Doona) and Detective Lee (Lee Joo-young) — shadow them, hoping to make an arrest. Soo-jin is especially vehement in her disdain for the brokers, but she carries even more scorn for Moon So-young. How could a woman be so irresponsible, so callous? Moon So-young may be asking herself that same question. However, Lee Ji-eun’s breathtaking performance shows us a character who holds her cards close to her chest. For much of the film, we don’t know what motivates her, and her gradual unfolding is captivating. 

The more we get to know these misfits and their world, the more morally ambiguous the concept of the baby box becomes. Unwanted pregnancies are common across cultures, and South Korea didn’t decriminalize abortion until 2021. Kore-eda challenges us to be comfortable with moral ambiguity — to observe and react without judgment. 

Kore-eda is a wonderful storyteller, and you’d be hard-pressed not to grow fond of these characters. While the mismatched family members of Broker have experienced trauma, they are not defined by it. Instead, they find grace in one another — and that transcends all else. Kore-eda leaves it up to the viewer to decide if they deserve it.