Newly arrived in New York, a Polish woman finds herself forced into prostitution by a man who picks her up.

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When Ewa (Marion Cotillard) arrives at New York’s Ellis Island, she can’t wait to live the American dream. Far from her native Poland, she and her sister expect to meet family members there. When her sister is quarantined with tuberculosis, Ewa finds out that no one is picking them up and that she has to go back to Poland. Then she meets Bruno (Joaquin Phoenix), who takes her home and gives her odd jobs to do. But it comes with a price: eager to help her sister, Ewa lets herself be blackmailed by Bruno and things soon turn bad. The troubled relationship between the pimp and his “protégé” soon oscillates between love, jealousy and manipulation...

Strange love story about the sex trade posing as mutual assistance, with a sordid and cold winter haze settling over this rather long movie by James Gray. With a hooker who knows nothing but pain, a pimp who falls in love and an illusionist who doesn’t come back out of his hat, this trio of characters is not really winning.