🔗 Share this article

Few things in any society carry as much ridiculousness and power as its traditional beliefs. This Taiwanese drama introduces us to I-Jing, a sweet five-year-old who has just moved back to Taipei with her mother and older sister. She gets direct personal experience when her grandfather warns her for using her left hand for everything – it’s unnatural, he insists; it’s the devil at work, he claims.

As I-Jing gazes upon her appendage with worry, a new relationship forms between her and her so-called sinister hand while she adjusts to city life. Shot entirely with iPhones, debut solo director and screenwriter Shih-Ching Tsou, together with frequent collaborator Sean Baker, captures the frenetic energy and sensory immersion of Taipei. Vibrant crimson Chinese characters cover the glass windows of a pawn shop; the pleasant melody of trash-collecting trucks fills the air; the easy ping-pong of Mandarin and Taiwanese between generations; verdant foliage against aged structures that nearly make you smell the specific essence of a bustling, wetter city. It’s less a love letter from a fan as it is a devotional to a place known by heart. Tsou pairs the vivid glimpses of the city with the splinters of imperfect people – movingly showing what it means to be a family in Taiwan, and delivering a triumph of a film.

Family Dynamics and Personal Struggles

The drama, Taiwan’s submission for best international feature film at the Oscars, starts with I-Jing, her older sister, and her mom in a rebuild stage. Thoughtful mom Shu-Fen has set up a night market noodles stand, and the unpredictable I-Ann has dropped out and works at a betel nut stall, where she’s in a relationship with her boss. I-Jing, played by the utterly delightful Nina Ye, begins a new school and, with the wonder only a child can have, experiments with the potential of this newly anointed devil hand.

As she starts pocketing trinkets at the night market with the forbidden hand, separating a right hand that does what’s required and the other that pursues what the heart desires, Tsou gracefully reflects each character’s own dualities. Here, the film portrays the complexities between what a person feels obligated to and what she truly wants: Shu-Fen can’t untangle herself from her former husband’s debts; I-Ann feels relegated to the role her mom wants her to play as she watches her peers move forward; I-Jing is told to be seen and not heard.

Cinematic Craft and Emotional Resonance

Tsou, along with Baker as editor and Ko-Chin Chen and Tzu-Hao Kao as cinematographers, skillfully lands us onto each family member’s separate planets, with many shots recording the lively and delightful rhythms of daily Taipei life. We’re eye-level with I-Jing as she makes her first theft, the excitement building with a camera unsteady and beat staccato. The camera pans overhead as I-Ann rides her scooter at night, city lights glistening in the heat, bringing an expansive feeling of freedom with a pain that’s uniquely hers to feel.

A feeling of responsibility is deftly woven into each conundrum, as well as the isolation that comes with it – it’s at once personal and heartbreaking to see how duty is often a solitary experience. We see it when I-Jing tries in sincerity to draw with her right hand, when I-Ann rests in bed after being mocked at an ex-classmate’s motel party. Meanwhile, Shu-Fen scrambles to make rent, her own mom irritated she needs help yet again. “A married daughter’s like water that’s poured out,” says the grandma; a son would have still been her responsibility.

Moments of Light and Character Portrayals

There are also touches of humor and playfulness, especially with the grandma’s bouts of anger, time with a meerkat that becomes I-Jing’s pet, and I-Jing’s general delight with the world. Ye, who is a left-hander in real life, expertly walks the tightrope of an innocent child absorbing the financial realities and unfamiliar forces – Shu-Fen’s ex, the grandma’s antics, I-Ann and Shu-Fen’s arguments – that surround her. Ma’s I-Ann, too, is a thoughtful portrait of an sharp teenager dealing with grief, making it feel like an undeniable but prohibitive emotion in an environment where everyone’s just trying to survive.

Climactic Scenes and Central Ideas

By the dramatic second-to-last dinner scene, the clan has nurtured big secrets that lead to the ultimate Taiwanese diu lian (losing of face): getting humiliated in front of an audience. And the revelations are good – by that point, it’s like uncovering a juicy, painful secret about a dear friend. Tsou and Baker’s script sharply examines what it really means to be shamed: which disgraces are noble, which are self-serving, and what should be passed from one generation to the next?

Some of these bombs are left unresolved after the big confrontation, and Left-Handed Girl may leave you wanting more – but perhaps also realizing that blowing it all up doesn’t mean resolution or a neat lesson immediately follows, or that there will be a devil’s hand to blame. Instead, perhaps the city just awakens to another day, and, a little lighter (having lost a little face), so do you.

• Availability: The film is released in certain theaters on November 14 and on streaming platforms from 28 November.