Forge

OPENING NIGHT FILM

Official Selection, 2025 SXSW Film Festival

In the heat of the Miami art market, siblings Raymond and Coco run the best forgery racket in town around Coco’s uncanny ability to reproduce a painting down to its age-specific varnish. But when they ascend into the big time, Coco’s skills can’t guarantee buyers any more than Raymond’s faked certificates of ownership. That is, until they meet Holden Beaumont, a shifty millennial desperate to use his blue blood provenance to sell fake masterpieces for a cash bailout. As the team lures in a hush-hush art dealer, FBI Art Crimes agent Emily Lee follows a hunch that a new counterfeiting talent is cooking in Miami. As Emily starts to show up at Raymond and Coco’s Chinese family restaurant, this big job might very well be their last.

In debut filmmaker Jing Ai Ng’s hands, high art is the ultimate hood ornament in a Miami of country clubs and liquor stores, fake IDs and luxury event scams, where the real currency is clout and everyone’s running an angle. A crime ring movie with a distinctly Asian American take, FORGE’s ensemble cast of Kelly Marie Tran (The Wedding Banquet, Raya and the Last Dragon), Andie Ju (Beef), and Brandon Soo Hoo serves the adrenaline of faking it and taking it.

– Christina Ree

Director Jing Ai Ng scheduled to attend for post-screening Q&A.

FREE pre-screening reception for All-Fest Pass and Opening Night Film ticket holders: 5:30PM – 6:45 PM