Some movies can bring me close to the life of the people I never have come across. “A Better Life”, a simple but heartfelt drama about one man struggling for him and his son in the world which do not welcome him openly, is such a case. Although I do not think I can talk or discuss about the issues it indirectly raises through his story because I am an outsider and there are the people who know more about these issues than me, I could feel a lot of empathy toward the human relationship at the center of the story while watching it, and it touched somewhere in my heart.

Carlos Galindo(Demián Bichir) is a gardener working in LA, and he can be a exemplar case of a hard-working American. He wakes up early at his home in the morning, and then, by his employer’s truck, he goes around several big houses for tending the gardens with his employer. This is a hard work, but Carlos is a man dedicated to his job and he is proud of what he has accomplished, a small but nice house for him and his son Luis(José Julián) with the backyard for growing plants for his works.

However, his daily life is very fragile, because he has been an illegal immigrant for many years. Even with one small wrong step, he can be caught by the police and deported back to Mexico. At least, thanks to his longtime employer/close friend who trusts him, he has a stable job unlike other illegal immigrant workers, who try hard to get the chance to work every morning in front of the potential employers like he once did before.

But his employer tells him that he decides to retire and he will move back to Mexico, so Carlos finds himself at the important decision point. His employer is willing to sell his truck and other equipments to him, and he can have the business of his own. He hesitates because it is a risky choice and he does not have enough money to buy them, but the offer is tantalizing, for he does not want to go back to where he was. Thanks to his sister, who gives him the money she has saved for her family, he eventually buys the truck, but, unfortunately, his happiness gets broken on his very first day as the employer – his truck is stolen right in front of his eyes.

Now, around this point, Vittorio De Sica’s great film “The Bicycle Thief”(1948) will immediately come upon your mind. Carlos is quite devastated by his misfortune, but, on the next day, he begins the search with his son. While looking at their quest to find the man who stole the truck, the movie shows us the shabby sides of LA such as a stuffy apartment where many illegal immigrants manage to live together while hiding from the authorities.

While following a familiar plot, the sincere screenplay by Eric Eason and Roger L. Simon presents us the small intimate moments between its characters. Carlos and Luis have been distant from each other mainly due to the difference of their daily life patterns(when Carlos wakes up early in the morning, his son is still sleeping in his bedroom; when Luis comes back to home late in the evening, his father, exhausted due to his work, is sleeping in the couch in the living room), but, through their search for the truck, they get the chance to reconnect with each other, and the movie observes the gradual change in their relationship with precision rather than pushing them along the plot.

Demián Bichir, who appeared in the TV series “Weeds” and several notable films including Steven Soderbergh’s “Che”(2008), was Oscar-nominated for his understated but resonating performance early in this year(I think that is the major reason for why this small film will be released at South Korean theaters earlier than I expected). Through one of the memorable performances in last year, Bichir gives his character lots of fine human details to make him far more than a stereotype, and Carlos comes to us as a human being with the strong sense of morality and the quiet dogged determination.

Bichir and his co-performers paint a realistic picture of the hard life in LA with the humane touches. When Carlos finally confronts the man responsible for his plight later in the story, they stare each other without a word, but what they respectively feel is clear to us. He is not a bad man, and Carlos understands that man’s motive well unlike his furious son, because, I guess, he had been there before.

The newcomer José Julián also does a good supporting job as the son who comes to understand his father more than before, who has raised him by himself since his mother left them when he was very young. Although he is almost close to joining the local gang in his neighbourhood, Luis is not a bad kid, and, through the journey with his father, he learns that the life is not as easy as he thought– and how much his father wants to give him a better chance.

You will be surprised that “A Better Life” is directed by Chris Weitz, who made a good debut with his brother Paul Weitz through their raunchy but sweet teenager comedy “American Pie”(1999) and then has filled his directing career with several diverse films including “About a Boy”(2002), “The Golden Compass”(2007), and “New Moon”(2009)(I heard that Bichir initially thought he would play a vampire gardener when he was approached by Weitz). This small movie movingly tells us how important the family is to some people on the fringe of the society, and how much they try their best for their family. It’s a sad, desperate tale with heartbreaks, but there are always hope and optimism – because they never give up.