Few things in any society carry as much ridiculousness and power as its superstitions. This Taiwanese drama introduces us to I-Jing, a endearing five-year-old who has just moved back to Taipei with her mother and older sister. She gets direct personal experience when her grandfather admonishes her for using her left hand for everything – it’s not natural, he insists; the devil’s influence, he claims.
As I-Jing gazes upon her limb with concern, a new bond forms between her and her so-called devil hand while she explores city life. Filmed completely with iPhones, debut solo director and screenwriter Shih-Ching Tsou, along with frequent collaborator Sean Baker, captures the frenetic energy and sensory experience of Taipei. Bright red Chinese characters overtake the glass windows of a pawn shop; the cheerful tune of trash-collecting trucks fills the air; the fluid exchange of Mandarin and Taiwanese between generations; lush trees against grimy buildings that nearly make you smell the unique atmosphere of a vibrant, humid city. It’s not so much a tribute from a fan as it is a devotional to a place known by heart. Tsou combines the vivid glimpses of the city with the splinters of flawed individuals – tenderly showing what it means to be a family in Taiwan, and delivering a triumph of a film.
Family Dynamics and Inner Conflicts
The story, Taiwan’s entry for best foreign language film at the Oscars, starts with I-Jing, her older sister, and her mom in a period of reconstruction. Thoughtful mom Shu-Fen has set up a night market noodles stand, and the unpredictable I-Ann has left high school and works at a betel nut stall, where she’s in a relationship with her boss. I-Jing, played by the very charming Nina Ye, starts 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 cursed limb, separating a right hand that does what’s required and the other that entertains what the heart desires, Tsou skillfully reflects each character’s own dualities. Here, the film portrays the complexities between what a person feels obligated to and what she genuinely desires: Shu-Fen can’t free herself from her trash ex-husband’s debts; I-Ann feels reduced to the role her mom wants her to play as she watches her peers move forward; I-Jing is told to be present but silent.
Visual Storytelling and Emotional Depth
Tsou, along with Baker as editor and Ko-Chin Chen and Tzu-Hao Kao as cinematographers, skillfully places us onto each family member’s separate planets, with many shots capturing the lively and charming rhythms of daily Taipei life. We’re at the same height with I-Jing as she makes her first theft, the adrenaline rushing with a camera shaky 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 sense of duty is expertly integrated into each dilemma, as well as the isolation that comes with it – it’s at once intimate and saddening to see how duty is often a lonely journey. We see it when I-Jing tries in sincerity to draw with her right hand, when I-Ann lays in bed after being mocked at an ex-classmate’s motel party. Meanwhile, Shu-Fen struggles 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 Performances
There are also moments of levity and fun, especially with the grandma’s bouts of anger, time with a meerkat that becomes I-Jing’s pet, and I-Jing’s general joy with the world. Ye, who is a left-hander in real life, expertly walks the tightrope of an young girl absorbing the financial realities and unfamiliar forces – Shu-Fen’s ex, the grandma’s hijinks, I-Ann and Shu-Fen’s arguments – that surround her. Ma’s I-Ann, too, is a considered portrait of an acerbic teenager dealing with grief, making it feel like an inescapable but unaffordable emotion in an environment where everyone’s just trying to survive.
Final Acts and Themes
By the soap opera-like 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 disclosures are powerful – by that point, it’s like discovering a shocking, painful secret about a close companion. Tsou and Baker’s script sharply examines what it really means to lose face: 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 unexcavated after the big showdown, and Left-Handed Girl may leave you dissatisfied – but perhaps also understanding that blowing it all up doesn’t mean closure 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.
- Release Information: Left-Handed Girl is released in certain theaters on November 14 and on streaming platforms from November 28.
