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Few things in any society carry as much absurdity and potency as its traditional beliefs. This Taiwanese drama introduces us to I-Jing, a sweet five-year-old who has recently relocated 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 evil, he claims.

As I-Jing stares at her hand with concern, a new relationship forms between her and her so-called devil hand while she explores city life. Filmed completely with iPhones, debut solo director and co-writer Shih-Ching Tsou, together with frequent collaborator Sean Baker, summons the frenetic energy and sensory experience of Taipei. Bright red Chinese characters cover the glass windows of a pawn shop; the pleasant melody of garbage trucks fills the air; the fluid exchange of Mandarin and Taiwanese between generations; verdant foliage against grimy buildings that nearly make you smell the specific essence of a vibrant, wetter city. It’s less a tribute from a fan as it is a devotional to a place known by heart. Tsou pairs the vivid glimpses of the city with the complexities of flawed individuals – tenderly showing what it means to be a family in Taiwan, and presenting a triumph of a film.

Family Relationships and Personal Struggles

The story, Taiwan’s submission for best foreign language film at the Oscars, starts with I-Jing, her older sister, and her mom in a rebuild stage. Thoughtful mom Shu-Fen has established 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 utterly delightful Nina Ye, starts a new school and, with the wonder only a child can have, tests out the potential of this newly anointed devil hand.

As she begins stealing trinkets at the night market with the forbidden hand, separating a good 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 duty-bound to and what she genuinely desires: Shu-Fen can’t untangle herself from her former 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 seen and not heard.

Cinematic Craft and Emotional Depth

Tsou, along with Baker as editor and Ko-Chin Chen and Tzu-Hao Kao as cinematographers, expertly lands us onto each family member’s separate planets, with many shots recording the frisky and delightful rhythms of daily Taipei life. We’re eye-level with I-Jing as she makes her first pilfering, the excitement building with a camera unsteady and beat staccato. The camera sweeps above 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 intimate and saddening to see how duty is often a solitary experience. We see it when I-Jing tries in earnest 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 annoyed 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.

Lighter Moments 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 left-handed in real life, expertly walks the tightrope of an young girl absorbing the financial realities and unknown entities – 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 thoughtful 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.

Climactic Scenes and Central Ideas

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

Some of these revelations are left unresolved after the big confrontation, and Left-Handed Girl may leave you dissatisfied – but perhaps also realizing that airing everything doesn’t mean resolution or a neat lesson immediately follows, or that there will be a sinister influence to blame. Instead, perhaps the city just awakens to another day, and, a little freer (having lost a little face), so do you.

• Availability: Left-Handed Girl is available in certain theaters on 14 November and on streaming platforms from 28 November.