Left-Handed Girl, 2025.
Directed by Shih-Ching Tsou.
Starring Janel Tsai, Shih-Yuan Ma, Nina Ye, and Brando Huang.
SYNOPSIS:
A single mother and her two daughters relocate to Taipei to open a night market stall, each navigating the challenges of adapting to their new environment while striving to maintain family unity.
Fresh off four Oscar wins for Anora, few would have expected Sean Baker’s next project to be co-writing and producing a Taiwanese film about a young girl and her family. The project has been in various stages of development since Baker first announced it in 2012. He and director Shih-Ching Tsou, finally began shooting in 2022 and the project now debuts on the festival circuit. It bears some similarities to Baker’s own work as a director, especially The Florida Project but his involvement shouldn’t take away from the work of the other creatives. It is a heartfelt, intimate story, anchored by a remarkable child performance.
It is a contemporary story, deeply rooted in its Taiwanese setting, but it has a global appeal through the broken family dynamics that flow through it. I-Jing (Nina Ye) and her family return to their roots. I-Jing uses her left hand in front of her grandfather, who tells her that it is the devil’s hand, and she subsequently believes this, which leads to chaos. This is a story about generational divides and shifting values. This was something that happened to Shih-Ching Tsou herself, and so it is clearly a story close to her heart.
Single mother Shu-Fen (Janel Tsai) is struggling to put food on the table for her two daughters, running an arcade noodle stand. While her daughter, I-Ann (Shih-Yuan Ma) has a job she is barely committed to and a somewhat carefree attitude to life. There are twists aplenty, and the reasons why they are in the situation they are completely re-evaluate prior events and the nature of the relationships between the central trio.
Shot using an iPhone there is a kineticism to proceedings and a slightly unpolished, documentary like feel that suits the arcades and food markets the trio frequent. There’s also an almost soap opera quality to some of the family dynamics, but rather than succumbing to melodrama or far-fetched storylines, Ching Tsou crafts an electric, deeply intimate story that crosses the generational threshold.
These characters all have secrets they are hiding from one another, like the family’s grandmother using illegal passports to smuggle in immigrants. These come home to roost at a 60th birthday party in her honour. She is the familial matriarch who dotes on her son but treats her daughters with more contempt.
Left-Handed Girl may create buzz from Sean Baker’s involvement but it is a labour of love for its first-time director, led by remarkable performances and a tight-knit story that keeps us engrossed throughout, the disparate parts intersecting wonderfully at its end. On Netflix in November it certainly deserves to be seen by a wide audience.
Flickering Myth Rating – Film: ★ ★ ★ ★ / Movie: ★ ★ ★ ★
Chris Connor
