Family Ties

South Korean writer-director Tae-Yong Kim's Family Ties (Gajokeui Tansaeng) constitutes a bittersweet drama of broken and dysfunctional suburban relationships. Kim divides his narrative into three sections. In the first, horticulturist and restaurateur Mira's (Moon So-ri) gentle and ordered life gets turned inside out with a bevy of houseguests who pop in and plop down indefinitely, from her strident, chain-smoking sister-in-law Mu-shin (Ko Doo-shim), to her ex-con brother Hyungchul (Eom Tae-woong). In the second, Sunkyung's (Kong Hyo-jin) failure to come to terms with her partially estranged mother's terminal illness brings her to the point of expatriation - a plan thwarted by her half brother. And in the third, these first two stories suddenly intersect with great volatility.