The family in Shoplifters lives in a small home in some forgotten quarter of Tokyo. The father is unable to work because of an accident at a construction site. The mother was laid off from a crummy job at a factory. The mother's sister works in the sex industry. The children shoplift to make ends meet. The family's only sure source of income is the grandmother's pension transferred to her from her dead husband. (The grandmother also has a taste for gambling.) One day, the family adopts a stranger—a girl from an abusive home. She is a runaway. She joins the family and soon also learns the art of shoplifting. There is a good reason why Shoplifters won the Palme d'Or at this year's Cannes Film Festival. It is a carefully and beautifully crafted work that appears to be about one thing (the strong bonds of family life), but is really about something else—the way a city forces us to invent our lives. by Charles Mudede