“I tried to transfer at the present, the emotions of a little girl facing these extraordinary incidents; abandonment and adoption. The year at the orphanage is the time and place of an intervening period between two lives: a life in which she didn’t have to learn how to let go and then a life in which she will learn how to desire.” ? Ounie Lecomte Produced by acclaimed filmmaker Lee Chang-dong, [A Brand New Life] injects fresh blood into what could easily be a manipulative and cliched identity tale. Set in a South Korean orphanage in the mid ‘70s, the film avoids over-sentimentality in favor of a clear-eyed rendering of a child’s perception of change. Jin-hee (a vaguely autobiographical character) is an isolated and intentionally abandoned 9-year-old who is just as jarringly adopted away to France. Before that, however, Jin-hee is forced to deal with abandonment over and over again. Jin-hee’s fleeting relationships are as emotionally engaging as they are heartbreaking, and underscore the child’s innate abilities to survive.