Don Shanahan
Thanks to the likes of Miami Vice, Scarface, and the Bad Boys franchise, the Magic City carries a reputation of sleaziness that can be as thick and sticky as the South Florida humidity. The opening scene of the independent film Forge typifies that trait cunningly, even though it’s set in late December, when Miami’s mugginess is at its lowest. A young and seemingly desperate Chinese woman (Andie Ju of The Greatest Hits and Netflix’s Beef) has assembled family heirlooms at a dingy motel and is waiting on an art appraisal specialist she found on Craigslist. If “dingy” and “Craigslist” aren’t on your “sleazy” bingo card, you’re in the wrong game.
Regardless, in walks Sandy Baker, played by Grey’s Anatomy favorite, T. R. Knight, with his ill-fitting taupe suit, minor Southern drawl, and generalized friendliness. He pitches his expertise in the field and takes great interest in a particular painting done by a notable artist he recognizes. The name shocks him, and his widened eyes do a terrible job of hiding his greedy excitement. Sandy makes a $10,000 pitch and soon doubles it to $20,000, volleying every compliment and assurance he can to put his customer at ease.
Watching this introduction in Forge, we think the swindle is on from Mr. Baker. The woman’s wavering to part with something from her grandmother is palpable until she turns away from Sandy to think once more. This time, her expression of worry transforms to a devious smile. At that instant, the electronic score from composers Marco Carrión and Ian Chang kicks in, and now we know, to our wry delight, the true swerve. The swindler is getting swindled.
The woman’s real name is Coco Zhang, and she forges art, right down to a homemade recreation of an antique varnish that can beat ultraviolet light scanners. Her partner-in-crime is her ambitious brother Raymond (Brandon Soo Hoo, grown up from being a child actor in Tropic Thunder, G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra, and Ender’s Game), first seen in Forge watching the Sandy Baker hustle go down through watchful binoculars on a balcony across the street. His speciality is fake IDs and documents, while he holds down a job as a beach boy at a lavish resort.
Both have been lying to their restaurateur family—led by their encouraging mother, Jeanette (Dawn Ying Yeun of The Harvest) — for years, believing Raymond is a proper business-card-carrying banker. They appear to be in lockstep with the general plan to avoid larger cons that carry greater risks. That changes when Coco dupes Raymond into building a relationship with a silver spoon heir named Holden Beaumont (Civil War’s Edmund Donovan) and his arm candy girlfriend, Talia (Eva De Dominici of Hulu’s The Cleaning Lady). The wealthy couple scheme to hire Coco to recreate his grandfather’s ruined art collection of never-seen classics to sell at auction or to high-end private buyers through professional art dealer Ann LaSalle (TV veteran Sonya Walger).
Taking on this dangerous undertaking is a chance for Coco to flex her talent. She’s been wanting bigger scores to challenge her chops. By her own words, “forgery is a new creation” that comes from an equally skilled artist who can match a style with utmost accuracy of technique. Imitations or not, she asserts her own authorship. Supplying the necessary detail and proficiency, Forge goes behind-the-crime to show Coco’s lucious and superlative work, created for the film by a team of five artists, including Jess Xiaoyi Han, Magnus Sodamin, and Ernesto Gutierrez Moya.
Playing Coco, Andie Ju emerges as the performance centerpiece of Forge. There is no immigrant naivety or a case of someone being taken advantage of for their lucrative and exploitable skills. As we see, any innocence Coco shows is an act for survival and ducking suspicion, as her hubris and ego take over. Additionally, and contrary to tropes from a host of other caper films, writer-director Jing Ai Ng refreshingly doesn’t give Coco a romantic arc or love interest, freezing her focus on her art. In fact, the only sliver of sympathy comes from Coco’s will as a minority trying to find comfortable financial success independently. Yet, that fraction of a Robin Hood-esque venture to fleece the admonishing privileged who buy her work is enough to make us root for her success instead of her demise or comeuppance.
Alas, the long arm of the law is never far behind shady business. A bump in reported art forgery discoveries, including Sandy Baker’s hot tip report, has brought unwavering FBI Agent Emily Lee (the top-lining Kelly Marie Tran of the Star Wars sequels) down from New York City to Miami to crack the case, even as her field office peers laugh at the supposed insignificance of art forgery. Forge adds a heavy dose of dramatic irony for the audience as the knower of true identities when Agent Lee comes to frequent and befriend Jeanette and Coco at the restaurant. The question then becomes who or what fails first, and the list of potentially problematic elements and character choices gets longer by the minute.
What isn’t problematic is Forge’s suave and efficient screenplay from Jing Ai Ng, making her feature debut after an eight-year resume of promising short films. The smoothness comes from scaffolding the idiosyncrasies of the underground art world, fueled by favors and authenticity. By empowering the prowess of the Coco character, Ng showcases this titular crime’s uniqueness, where not just anyone can pull it off. Unlike wild bank robberies or other stunt-filled heists, art forgery is a quieter landscape looking to tantalize those with a seedy desire for decadence. Forge proves a smarter, savvier approach can generate that subtler type of intrigue and suspense by lifting a paintbrush instead of a pistol.
