Somewhere in Florida in an old motel, a girl named Coco (Andie Ju) meets with a man from Craigslist. He’s there to evaluate a piece of art she found after her grandmother’s death. It’s unclear at first who the real threat is – will this man take advantage of Coco or is she hiding something beneath her facade of grief?
Turns out it’s the latter – Coco, along with her brother Raymond (Brandon Soo Hoo), runs a small-time art forgery scam, peddling fakes of pricey works of American art. Their target falls for the scam, shelling out $20,000 for a painting that he will find out is counterfeit way too late.
In this era, art is so easily reproducible. AI is an all-too-real threat to the film industry and to intelligence as a whole. During one key scene in Forge, Kelly Marie Tran’s FBI agent Emily, who has recently moved to Miami, asks an art enthusiast how upset she would be if she found out that Mozart’s water lilies weren’t actually his, but a cheap replica made by some guy in a basement.
The girl she’s questioning is clearly upset by this notion, but it’s not something Coco and Raymond seem to have thought of. Their goal is money and though Coco has a pᴀssion for what she does, the sancтιтy of art is not something often on her mind. To them, art is the scam – the act of reproducing, of pulling a fast one.
Forge Is A Well-Done Thriller
It Just Lacks The Propulsion To Fully Take Off
When Coco and Raymond become involved with Holden Beaumont, they finally see the biggest score of all. Holden is a typical rich white boy who has fallen from grace, even more careless about art than Raymond or Coco. He has let his grandfather’s priceless art collection go to ruin in the basement because he didn’t realize it could flood in Miami or that rats would be interested in eating the canvases.
Holden asks Raymond and Coco to recreate this ruined collection of art so that he can sell it and fix his reputation and his empty bank account. Coco is more eager to do it than her brother, but eventually they both get swept up in the scam. On their tail is Emily, who accidentally becomes close to Coco and Raymond’s mother by frequenting their family’s Dim Sum restaurant.
Emily is all alone in the city, the restaurant a representation of everything she doesn’t have – community (her FBI colleagues laugh at her), family (there’s no mention of them), and a reminder of home. Through Emily, Forge reveals a story about family, the American Dream, community, and art and its role in our lives.
Forge chooses to be contemplative rather than exhilarating, using the Miami cityscape for something much more intimate.
Though it is essentially a heist thriller, Forge chooses to be contemplative rather than exhilarating, using the Miami cityscape for something much more intimate. From Holden’s dilapidated McMansion to a hazy, neon-lit club and the stripmall Dim Sum restaurant, there’s an unᴀssuming quality to the way life is depicted.
How everything plays out is reflective of that – there’s no standoff or shootout, no FBI raids or car chases. It doesn’t need that to effectively tell its story, though Forge would’ve benefited from revving up just a bit. For Jing Ai Ng, Forge is her debut feature, and it marks a confident debut from the young director, showing a grasp of both тιԍнт storytelling and sprawling emotion.
Forge premiered at the 2025 SXSW Film Festival.
