South Korean independent film “Lucky, Apartment” is a quiet but tense drama about one lesbian couple who happen to be under a lot of pressure and conflict. All they simply want is a stable living environment where they can happily live together, but then they come to face their harsh reality in one way or another as their supposedly cozy apartment gets saddled with one big problem, and the movie is sometimes realistically frightening for good reasons.

At the beginning, the movie quickly and succinctly establishes how things have been not that good for Seon-woo (Son Soo-hyun) and Hee-seo (Park Ga-young). Mainly thanks to some loan Hee-seo recently got, they could buy a little apartment for living together, but then they only find themselves struggling to pay the mortgage and interest. To make matters worse, their financial status becomes less stable as Seon-woo loses her job after getting seriously injured in her right leg, and Hee-seo, who works as a saleswoman for some big pharmaceutical company, certainly feels pressured a lot as she must earn more than before.

While trying to adjust herself to this changed circumstance, Seon-woo begins to notice something strange on one day. There is a very unpleasant smell somewhere inside the apartment, and it does not take much time for her to discern that this nasty smell in question is actually coming from the apartment right below theirs, which incidentally belongs to some old lady living alone by herself. Seon-woo immediately goes to the maintenance office, but the maintenance office is not so particularly willing to take care of this problem, and the smell in the apartment only gets worse and worse during next several days.

In the end, the local police eventually come, and it soon turns out that the old lady actually died in her apartment several days ago at least. While many of the neighbors in the apartment building are quite shocked to say the least, they are also quite concerned about whether this unfortunate incident may affect the current value of their apartments, and they all hope that everything will be handled as quietly as possible without drawing any attention from the outside.

However, though the local police quickly close the case after concluding that the old lady really died of a natural cause, her apartment has not been cleaned yet due to some complicated legal problem, and it also seems that the old lady does not have any close family or relative to take care of this legal matter. Naturally getting quite frustrated with this maddening situation, Seon-woo decides to take care of this matter for herself, but Hee-seo is understandably not pleased about how much her partner draws the attention from many others in the apartment building.

It gradually turns out that Heo-seo has a fair share of problems to deal with outside their apartment. Because she has presented herself as a single woman simply not so interested in marriage, she often faces the prejudices from others including her male boss and colleagues, and she is also often pressured a lot by her Christian parents, who still do not know anything at all about her private life with Seon-woo. She tries to assure herself and Seon-woo that everything is and will be okay as long as they stay as low as possible, but her anxiety and frustration are already quite evident to Seon-woo, and this puts another strain on their relationship besides the smell in their apartment and more prejudice from some of their neighbors.

Slowly dialing up the level of tension between its two main characters along the story, the screenplay by director/writer Kangyu Ga-ram adds more details to the story and characters. When she later enters the old lady’s apartment by a good chance, Seon-woo instinctively senses something common between her and the old lady, and that becomes more evident when she finally meets someone in the old lady’s past. Nothing much is said between them on the surface, but it is quite clear that the old lady was quite close to that figure in question, and Seon-woo cannot possibly say no when that figure asks her a little but important favor.

Around the last act, the movie expectedly becomes more melodramatic as Seon-woo and Heo-seo come to conflict more with each other while also experiencing more of their harsh reality out there, but it is still held well together by the strong performance from Son Soo-hyun and Park Ga-young. Right from the beginning, they look believable as effortlessly embodying the long history between their characters, and that is why it is devastating to watch their characters’ supposedly reliable relationship being driven almost up to the breaking point later in the story. Around these two good performers, several supporting performers including Lee Joo-young, Jung Ah-hwa, and Jeon So-hyeon are also solid in their respective parts, and Jung is particularly touching during her brief but crucial scene.

Overall, “Lucky, Apartment” is engaging for painfully and powerfully presenting the prejudices against many social issues in South Korea including aging and LGBTQ+ people, and it also makes some sharp point on how South Korean people can be quite selfish and superficial in case of their apartment. Although nothing much is certain for the two main characters of the film even in the end, there is also some glimmer of optimism via a little sign of solidarity and compassion shown from them, and that will probably make you reflect more on the main subjects of the film after it is over.