Pawn ~ My Name is Not Pawn. I Have a Real Name. |
“Pawn” is a 2020 Korean film, categorized as Family and Heartwarming Comedy, streaming on Viki.
SUMMARY: Life is hard for a little girl, who is the daughter of a widowed illegal immigrant, but her fortune changes unexpectedly.
♦ I’ll Just Take Your Daughter as Collateral
In “Pawn”, the year is 1993 and the place is Incheon, South Korea. Doo-Seok and Jong-Bae have been close friends since their days in the military. Now they work as debt collectors because they got into the loan shark business. Although Doo-Seok prefers to be called a financier. His friend thinks that’s just “word play”. At any rate, they don’t sit behind a desk and make phone calls. Their boss requires them to physically go to the debtor’s residence or workplace. This particular day, they are trying to find a lady who borrowed money, and she’s already two (2) months behind in her payments.
They find her and her daughter, Seung-Yi, walking on the street. Seung-Yi is about 10 years old, but she’s feisty. She sees the two (2) men bullying her mom, and she bites one of them. That doesn’t stop Doo-Seok and Jong-Bae from demanding that she make her payments. The mom is desperate. Her husband died, and she is unable to collect his paycheck from the employer. To make matters worse, she is a Chinese-Korean illegal immigrant. The law is not on her side. She promises to pay three (3) months when she gets the money.
Doo-Seok and Jong-Bae are desperate, too. Their boss expects results, and if they don’t bring in the payments, he’ll take it out of their salary. Out of the two of them, Doo-Seok is the more desperate. That’s why he grabbed the little girl and told her mother that he would keep her until she came up with the money! It’s cruel, and it’s also kidnapping, which is a crime. But he knew she wouldn’t go to the police because she is an illegal immigrant.
How could any of them know that the “kidnapping affair” would be a life-changing moment for all of them? The guys weren’t really mean, but they never intended to get attached to the little girl, and she never thought she would end up being separated from her mother. Her name is Seung-Yi, but Doo-Seok and Jong-Bae started calling her “Pawn”.
Main Characters:
- Doo-Seok (played by Sung Dong-Il, “Hijack 1971”, “The Cursed”, “The Chase”, “Curtain Call”, “Along With the Gods: The Last 49 Days”, “RV: Resurrected Victims”, “The Grand Heist”, “Han River Police”, “Ghost Doctor”, “Sisyphus: The Myth”, “The Art of Negotiation”, “Jirisan”)
- Seung-Yi (young) (played by Park So-Yi, “Revenant“*, “Jung_E”, “The Atypical Family”, “See You in My 19th Life”)
- Seung-Yi (played by Ha Ji-Won, “The Huntresses”, “Curtain Call”, “Empress Ki”, “Damo”)
- Jong-Bae (played by Kim Hee-Won**, “Troll Factory”, “Unlocked”, “Vanishing Time: A Boy Who Returned”, “Han River Police”, “Oh, The Mysterious”, “Kang Chi, the Beginning (aka ‘Gu Family Book’)”)
*Best Youth Actor & Actress – 2023 SBS Drama Awards
**Directed and acted in “Light Shop”
Viewership and Rating:
My personal rating is the same as the Viki viewers.
Although the film was released in 2020, it was just added to the Viki database for the US audience.
Only one word needed to describe “Pawn”: heartwarming.
Additionally, Park So-Yi, the child actress who worked alongside veteran adult actors, deserves HIGH PRAISE. She has already won an award and has quite a few acting credits.
Reviewers had nothing but wonderful things to say about this Korean movie while being careful to point out that it addressed a very serious topic. (See parenthetical notes below.)
LINKS OF INTEREST:
Pawn: Korean Movie Review | PinoySeoul.com (“It was a great quality movie. It has a simple plot but since they acted out their characters so well, it made it irresistibly beautiful.”)
Review: K-Movie “Pawn” Tugs Heartstrings and Shows Korean-Chinese Struggles | Cinema Escapist (“…family drama, and examines the plight of ethnic Koreans from China who immigrate to South Korea.”)
Movie Review: Pawn (담보) | Howard For Film (“The film hit the Number 1 spot at the South Korean box office on September 30th …”)
Pawn (South Korea, 2019) – Review | AsianMovieWeb (“If you are looking for another drama with a life-affirming basic framework, but also featuring some tearjerker moments, you cannot go wrong with ‘Pawn’.”)
Film Review: Pawn (2020) by Dae Gyu-kang | Asian Movie Pulse (“… a narratively wonky but heart-warming, chuckle-worthy tearjerker to watch with the family on a lazy Sunday afternoon.”)
Why Korean movie ‘Pawn’ is the perfect feel-good film to watch this week in the UAE | Entertainment | Gulf News (“It’s rare to find such cinematic gems that so effectively overcome language barriers to tug at heartstrings and draw you in for a long, warm hug.”)
TRAILER/TEASER:
CJ ENM. “PAWN Official Int’l Main Trailer.” YouTube, 9 Sept. 2020, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ylq5mKnv07Y.
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