Review: 'Tori and Lokita' is a harrowing drama about young refugees trying to survive an immigration nightmare

The directing brothers Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne have such a knack for zeroing in on people in the working class and underground economy of their home town of Liege, Belgium, that one almost takes it for granted — until they make another movie, like the heartbreaking “Tori and Lokita,” and find a whole new way to dive in to a compelling story.

Lokita (Joely Mbundu), a teen refugee from Benin, is concerned that she won’t get a visa to stay permanently in Belgium, like his 10-year-old brother, Tori (Pablo Schils), has. The immigration examiners ask Lokita about how she reunited with her brother at the refugee camp, and the holes and contradictions in her account have the examiners suspicious and doesn’t get her papers.

Getting her papers could open up Lokita’s world. It would mean she and Tori wouldn’t have to deliver marijuana to the clients of a shady dealer, Betim (Alban Ukaj), or take the 50 euros extra Betim offers if she’ll comply when he unzips his pants. Lokita and Tori need the money to send back to their mother, back in Benin, who berates Lokita for not sending 100 euros a month as was arranged. Lokita also is trying to dodge Firmin (Marc Zinga), the smuggler who got her and Tori to Belgium, and who still wants a cut of what Lokita earns.

With all these forces working against Lokita, she feels she’s left with one option: A job Betim has arranged, working 3 months in isolation tending the plants in his weed-growing operation. If she completes the three months, Betim will get her a reliable set of forged papers. But for various reasons, finishing that shift is a tough assignment.

The Dardennes get invitations to the Cannes Film Festival the way other people collect parking tickets — with Palme D’Or victories for “Rosetta” (1999) and “The Child” (2005), and “Tori and Lokita” got a special 75th anniversary prize last year. They do it by taking a social issue — in this case, the plight of refugees struggling to fit into Belgian society — and focus in on how one or two characters are affected by that issue.

“Tori and Lokita” may sound like a serious-minded message movie, but it plays like a thriller — with Lokita facing progressively more dire conditions to collect enough euros to satisfy Betim, Firmin and her mother, all at once. When Tori finds Lokita at the secret marijuana growing site, her calculations for how to survive this ordeal get immeasurably harder.

The other thing the Dardennes do is discover excellent young talent, and Mbundu and Schils are astonishingly good in their first movie roles. Their grim determination to stick together, and their hints that they have endured worse, are what propel “Tori and Lokita” to become a shattering portrayal of two children who have had to grow up way too fast.

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‘Tori & Lokita’

★★★1/2

Opens Friday, April 14, at the Broadway Centre Cinemas (Salt Lake City). Not rated, but probably R for violence, language, sexual content and drug use. Running time: 89 minutes; in French with subtitles.