Netflix has set a Nov. 14 theatrical release for their Cannes pick-up Left-Handed Girl from filmmaker Shih-Ching Tsou. The movie, which is co-written by multi-Oscar winner Sean Baker and Tsou and produced by the Anora filmmaker, will stream on Nov. 28.
We told you first that the streamer took most of the world on Tsou’s movie which played in Cannes Critics’ Week.
Pic won won the Gan Foundation Award and the Prix du Rail d’Or following its premiere on the Croissette.
The Mandarin and Taiwanese language movie follows a single mother and her two daughters who relocate to Taipei to open a night market stall, each of them navigating the challenges of adapting to their new environment while striving to maintain family unity. Janel Tsai stars as the mother, along with Nina Ye and Shih-Yuan Ma as the children.
Deadline Chief Film Critic Pete Hammond praised coming the pic at the fest,...
We told you first that the streamer took most of the world on Tsou’s movie which played in Cannes Critics’ Week.
Pic won won the Gan Foundation Award and the Prix du Rail d’Or following its premiere on the Croissette.
The Mandarin and Taiwanese language movie follows a single mother and her two daughters who relocate to Taipei to open a night market stall, each of them navigating the challenges of adapting to their new environment while striving to maintain family unity. Janel Tsai stars as the mother, along with Nina Ye and Shih-Yuan Ma as the children.
Deadline Chief Film Critic Pete Hammond praised coming the pic at the fest,...
- 7/30/2025
- by Anthony D'Alessandro
- Deadline Film + TV
Director, producer, and co-writer Shih-Ching Tsou returns to her childhood in Taipei, Taiwan, in the deeply personal Left-Handed Girl, which marks her first film as a solo director. The intimate, intergenerational drama first premiered at the Cannes Film Festival as part of the Critics’ Week section. Inspired by vibrant memories from Tsou’s upbringing and stories from friends and family, it is co-written, produced, and edited by Sean Baker (Anora), a frequent collaborator of Tsou’s dating back to 2004’s Take Out, which they co-directed.
Read on to find out more about Left-Handed Girl.
In Tsou’s coming-of-age portrait, a single mother (Janel Tsai) and her two daughters (Nina Ye and Shih-Yuan Ma in her acting debut) return to Taipei after several years of living in the countryside to open a stand at a buzzing night market. Each in their own way have to adapt to this new environment to...
Read on to find out more about Left-Handed Girl.
In Tsou’s coming-of-age portrait, a single mother (Janel Tsai) and her two daughters (Nina Ye and Shih-Yuan Ma in her acting debut) return to Taipei after several years of living in the countryside to open a stand at a buzzing night market. Each in their own way have to adapt to this new environment to...
- 7/30/2025
- by Jenny Changnon
- Tudum - Netflix
After premiering at this year’s Cannes Film Festival, where our own Ryan Lattanzio called it “a visually propulsive portrait” and hailed filmmaker Shih-Ching Tsou as “a confident directorial talent with a rare exuberance,” “Left-Handed Girl” is preparing for its next step: Awards season contender.
Netflix picked up the film, which debuted in Cannes’ Critics’ Week section, at the festival, and IndieWire can today announce that the streamer will bolster the film with both a theatrical release and a streaming release on its platform. The film is in contention as Taiwan’s national selection for the Oscars and has global distribution. You can also see three new stills, exclusive to IndieWire, both up top and below.
The film is Tsou’s debut solo directorial outing, but she’s been a mainstay in indie cinema for decades. A longtime collaborator of the celebrated filmmaker (and now multi-Oscar-winning filmmaker) Sean Baker, Tsou produced Baker’s films “Starlet,...
Netflix picked up the film, which debuted in Cannes’ Critics’ Week section, at the festival, and IndieWire can today announce that the streamer will bolster the film with both a theatrical release and a streaming release on its platform. The film is in contention as Taiwan’s national selection for the Oscars and has global distribution. You can also see three new stills, exclusive to IndieWire, both up top and below.
The film is Tsou’s debut solo directorial outing, but she’s been a mainstay in indie cinema for decades. A longtime collaborator of the celebrated filmmaker (and now multi-Oscar-winning filmmaker) Sean Baker, Tsou produced Baker’s films “Starlet,...
- 7/30/2025
- by Kate Erbland
- Indiewire
Exclusive: Netflix has acquired most of the global rights to Shih-Ching Tsou’s Cannes’ Critics Week movie Left-Handed Girl.
The movie, produced by and co-written by 4x Anora Oscar winner Sean Baker won the Gan Foundation Award as well as the Prix du Rail d’Or following its premiere at the Cannes Film Festival.
The Mandarin and Taiwanese language movie follows a single mother and her two daughters who relocate to Taipei to open a night market stall, each of them navigating the challenges of adapting to their new environment while striving to maintain family unity. Janel Tsai stars as the mother, along with Nina Ye and Shih-Yuan Ma as the children.
We heard back on the Croisette that Netflix was very excited about acquiring this movie.
“The original story comes from something my grandfather told me when I was young,” Tsou told Deadline’s Melanie Goodfellow in our Cannes Studio.
The movie, produced by and co-written by 4x Anora Oscar winner Sean Baker won the Gan Foundation Award as well as the Prix du Rail d’Or following its premiere at the Cannes Film Festival.
The Mandarin and Taiwanese language movie follows a single mother and her two daughters who relocate to Taipei to open a night market stall, each of them navigating the challenges of adapting to their new environment while striving to maintain family unity. Janel Tsai stars as the mother, along with Nina Ye and Shih-Yuan Ma as the children.
We heard back on the Croisette that Netflix was very excited about acquiring this movie.
“The original story comes from something my grandfather told me when I was young,” Tsou told Deadline’s Melanie Goodfellow in our Cannes Studio.
- 6/3/2025
- by Anthony D'Alessandro
- Deadline Film + TV
A Useful Ghost, the debut feature from Thai director Ratchapoom Boonbunchachoke that THR had featured as a hidden gem at Cannes, has won the Grand Prize at the 64th edition of Cannes Critics’ Week.
The absurdist fantasy comedy portrays a married couple where the wife dies of a respiratory illness caused by dust pollution, and then returns to the grieving husband as a ghost in the form of a vacuum cleaner. The Thai feature picked up the Grand Prix Ami Paris trophy as awards for the Critics Week section in Cannes were announced on Wednesday. The film stars Davika Hoorne and Witsarut Himmarat.
Also, the French Touch Prize of the Jury for best first feature went to Chechen director Deni Oumar Pitsaev for Imago, a France-Belgium co-production. And the Louis Roederer Foundation Rising Star Award for best actor went to Canada’s Theodore Pellerin for his performance in French director Pauline Loques’ Nino.
The absurdist fantasy comedy portrays a married couple where the wife dies of a respiratory illness caused by dust pollution, and then returns to the grieving husband as a ghost in the form of a vacuum cleaner. The Thai feature picked up the Grand Prix Ami Paris trophy as awards for the Critics Week section in Cannes were announced on Wednesday. The film stars Davika Hoorne and Witsarut Himmarat.
Also, the French Touch Prize of the Jury for best first feature went to Chechen director Deni Oumar Pitsaev for Imago, a France-Belgium co-production. And the Louis Roederer Foundation Rising Star Award for best actor went to Canada’s Theodore Pellerin for his performance in French director Pauline Loques’ Nino.
- 5/21/2025
- by Etan Vlessing
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Shih-Ching Tsou steps into the director’s chair with a quiet confidence that belies her two-decade collaboration with Sean Baker. Her solo debut unfolds in Taipei’s labyrinthine night market—streets alive with neon chatter, simmering woks and the restless shuffle of countless feet.
At its core lies a family portrait drawn in three hues: Shu-Fen, the weary mother clutching hope like a tattered umbrella; I-Ann, the restless teenager trading dreams for survival; and I-Jing, the five-year-old whose left hand carries a cultural curse.
Tsou co-writes and Baker edits with precision, grounding each scene in lived reality. Early sequences move with a gentle inevitability: Shu-Fen sorting noodles, I-Ann counting betel nuts, I-Jing darting between stalls.
Then the tonal compass spins. A 60th-birthday banquet erupts in melodrama so audacious it flirts with soap-opera territory—yet never collapses under its own weight. The shift feels startling, almost dialectical: realism confronts ritual, restraint collides with spectacle.
At its core lies a family portrait drawn in three hues: Shu-Fen, the weary mother clutching hope like a tattered umbrella; I-Ann, the restless teenager trading dreams for survival; and I-Jing, the five-year-old whose left hand carries a cultural curse.
Tsou co-writes and Baker edits with precision, grounding each scene in lived reality. Early sequences move with a gentle inevitability: Shu-Fen sorting noodles, I-Ann counting betel nuts, I-Jing darting between stalls.
Then the tonal compass spins. A 60th-birthday banquet erupts in melodrama so audacious it flirts with soap-opera territory—yet never collapses under its own weight. The shift feels startling, almost dialectical: realism confronts ritual, restraint collides with spectacle.
- 5/17/2025
- by Arash Nahandian
- Gazettely
“Left-Handed Girl” opens with a whimsical score that sounds like a sonic interpretation of the kaleidoscope that adorable five-year-old I-Jing (Nina Ye) looks through as she arrives in Taipei for the first time with her mother Shu-Fen (Janel Tsai) and older teen sister I-Ann (Shi-Yuan Ma). That bright piece of music comes to represent her innocent curiosity each time the nimble camera follows the vivacious and indeed left-handed girl through a new mischievous or misguided adventure in the neon-soaked metropolis.
Continue reading ‘Left-Handed Girl’ Review: Taipei-Set Drama Co-Written By Sean Baker is a Poignant Intergenerational Triptych [Cannes] at The Playlist.
Continue reading ‘Left-Handed Girl’ Review: Taipei-Set Drama Co-Written By Sean Baker is a Poignant Intergenerational Triptych [Cannes] at The Playlist.
- 5/15/2025
- by Carlos Aguilar
- The Playlist
In 2004, the world got its first sign of the grounded emotionality that collaborators Shih-Ching Tsou and Sean Baker could create in their co-directed neorealist feature “Take Out.” A portrait of a young man struggling to make ends meet in New York City by biking around delivering food, it was made for next to no money yet still left a mark because of how authentically lived-in it is.
Now, more than 20 years later, “Left-Handed Girl,” which is directed by Tsou from a script she co-wrote with Baker, trades NYC for Taipei and a bike for a scooter while maintaining the same sense of attention to detail and character. Though broader in scope as it follows a mother and her two daughters as they adapt to a move into the city, it shows how Tsou, a longtime producer on many of Baker’s films from “Tangerine” to “Red Rocket,” is more than...
Now, more than 20 years later, “Left-Handed Girl,” which is directed by Tsou from a script she co-wrote with Baker, trades NYC for Taipei and a bike for a scooter while maintaining the same sense of attention to detail and character. Though broader in scope as it follows a mother and her two daughters as they adapt to a move into the city, it shows how Tsou, a longtime producer on many of Baker’s films from “Tangerine” to “Red Rocket,” is more than...
- 5/15/2025
- by Chase Hutchinson
- The Wrap
What do you do after a record-setting haul of four individual Oscars including Best Picture for Anora? For Sean Baker, it is returning to his filmmaking roots and the Cannes Film Festival, where he also took the 2024 Palme d’Or for Anora. In this case he isn’t directing, instead leaving that to longtime collaborator Shih-Ching Tsou, who worked as a producer with him on earlier films including Starlet, Tangerine, The Florida Project and Red Rocket. The pair also co-directed a film called Take Out 21 years ago, and it has taken that long for Shih-Ching to take the reins of a second film, co-writing the script for Left-Handed Girl with Baker, who also serves as a producer and sole film editor. It premiered today in Cannes as part of Critics’ Week.
Set in a bustling Taiwanese night market that also seems like a Melrose Place-style food court, the film...
Set in a bustling Taiwanese night market that also seems like a Melrose Place-style food court, the film...
- 5/15/2025
- by Pete Hammond
- Deadline Film + TV
What do you do after setting a record haul of four individual Oscars including Best Picture for Anora? For Sean Baker it is returning to his filmmaking roots and the Cannes Film Festival where he also took the Palme d’Or last May for Anora. In this case he isn’t directing, and instead leaving that to long time collaborator Shih-Ching Tsou, who worked as a producer with him on earlier films like Starlet, Tangerine, The Florida Project, and Red Rocket. The pair also co-directed a film called Take Out 21 years ago, and it has taken that long for Shih-Ching to take on the reins of a second film, co-writing the script for Left-Handed Girl with Baker who also serves as a producer and sole film editor. It premiered today in Cannes as part of Critics Week.
Set in a bustling Taiwanese night market that also seems like a Melrose Place -style food court,...
Set in a bustling Taiwanese night market that also seems like a Melrose Place -style food court,...
- 5/14/2025
- by Pete Hammond
- Deadline Film + TV
The Cannes Film Festival—one of the world’s most prestigious film gathering and cultural events—alongside Marché du Film, will kick off on May 13.
Left-Handed Girl, a co-production between Taiwan, France, the United States, and the United Kingdom, has been selected for competition in Cannes parallel section “Critics’ Week”. Among over 1,000 films from 102 countries, Left-Handed Girl stands out as a remarkable achievement, drawing global attention.
Left-Handed Girl is the first solo-directed feature film by Taiwanese director Shih-Ching Tsou, co-produced by Academy Award-winning director Sean Baker. Starring Janel Tsai, Brando Huang, Shih-Yuan Ma and Nina Ye, Left-Handed Girl tells the story of a single mother and her two daughters returning from the countryside to their new life in a Taipei night market. The narrative explores the struggles and daily life under a patriarchal society.
Aside from the world premiere of the selected film at Cannes, this year also sees the...
Left-Handed Girl, a co-production between Taiwan, France, the United States, and the United Kingdom, has been selected for competition in Cannes parallel section “Critics’ Week”. Among over 1,000 films from 102 countries, Left-Handed Girl stands out as a remarkable achievement, drawing global attention.
Left-Handed Girl is the first solo-directed feature film by Taiwanese director Shih-Ching Tsou, co-produced by Academy Award-winning director Sean Baker. Starring Janel Tsai, Brando Huang, Shih-Yuan Ma and Nina Ye, Left-Handed Girl tells the story of a single mother and her two daughters returning from the countryside to their new life in a Taipei night market. The narrative explores the struggles and daily life under a patriarchal society.
Aside from the world premiere of the selected film at Cannes, this year also sees the...
- 5/13/2025
- by Suzie Cho
- AsianMoviePulse
Left-Handed Girl, directed by Shih-Ching Tsou and co-written by filmmaker Sean Baker, has been selected to compete in the 2025 Critics’ Week at the Cannes Film Festival. The Taipei-set family drama is one of seven features included in this year’s lineup for the parallel section, which focuses on first and second works from emerging directors.
Tsou, who previously collaborated with Baker on Take Out, Tangerine, Starlet, The Florida Project, and Red Rocket, directs the film solo. Baker also co-edited the project while overseeing the awards run for his film Anora, which won Best Picture, Best Director, and three other Oscars earlier this year.
Left-Handed Girl follows a single mother and her two daughters as they navigate the complexities of life in the Taiwanese capital. Janel Tsai, an actress and model based in Taiwan, leads the cast. The film blends social realism with a focus on working-class life, continuing themes explored...
Tsou, who previously collaborated with Baker on Take Out, Tangerine, Starlet, The Florida Project, and Red Rocket, directs the film solo. Baker also co-edited the project while overseeing the awards run for his film Anora, which won Best Picture, Best Director, and three other Oscars earlier this year.
Left-Handed Girl follows a single mother and her two daughters as they navigate the complexities of life in the Taiwanese capital. Janel Tsai, an actress and model based in Taiwan, leads the cast. The film blends social realism with a focus on working-class life, continuing themes explored...
- 4/14/2025
- by Naser Nahandian
- Gazettely
Fresh from his Oscars sweep with Cannes Palme d’Or winner Anora, Sean Baker could be back on the Croisette this year as the producer, co-writer and editor of long-time American-Taiwanese collaborator Shih-Ching Tsou’s Left-Handed Girl.
The Taipei-set drama was announced on Monday as having being selected for competition in Cannes parallel section Critics’ Week.
The film stars Taiwanese star Janel Tsai as a mother and her two daughters who returns to Taipei after several years of living in the countryside to open a stand at a buzzing night market.
The trio have to adapt to this new environment to make ends meet and succeed in maintaining the family unity. Three generations of family secrets begin to unravel after the youngest daughter who’s left-handed is told by her traditional grandfather to never use her “devil hand”.
Tsou has collaborated with Sean Baker since 2004, co-directing, co-writing and co-producing his second feature credit Take-Out.
The Taipei-set drama was announced on Monday as having being selected for competition in Cannes parallel section Critics’ Week.
The film stars Taiwanese star Janel Tsai as a mother and her two daughters who returns to Taipei after several years of living in the countryside to open a stand at a buzzing night market.
The trio have to adapt to this new environment to make ends meet and succeed in maintaining the family unity. Three generations of family secrets begin to unravel after the youngest daughter who’s left-handed is told by her traditional grandfather to never use her “devil hand”.
Tsou has collaborated with Sean Baker since 2004, co-directing, co-writing and co-producing his second feature credit Take-Out.
- 4/14/2025
- by Melanie Goodfellow
- Deadline Film + TV
Taiwanese cinema has been producing a series of crime movies lately, and quite diverse for matter, as titles like “Godspeed” and the “Gatao” franchise highlight. Chan Chun-hao attempts his own hand in the category, adapting Feng Shi’s novel, through an approach, though, that lingers somewhere between the pulp and the soap opera.
“You Have to Kill Me” is screening at Asian Pop-up Cinema
Police officer Chou is about to propose to his girlfriend, Chen, when he receives a homicide case report and follows it to the mountains. He even manages to catch the perpetrator, Li, but to his shock, he finds out that the victim was actually Chen. Despite being devastated and overly violent, he manages to exact an interrogation from Li, who insists, however, that the girl actually asked him to kill. Furthermore, it turns out that Li is the son of a very powerful man, Chairman Cheng-Wen Li,...
“You Have to Kill Me” is screening at Asian Pop-up Cinema
Police officer Chou is about to propose to his girlfriend, Chen, when he receives a homicide case report and follows it to the mountains. He even manages to catch the perpetrator, Li, but to his shock, he finds out that the victim was actually Chen. Despite being devastated and overly violent, he manages to exact an interrogation from Li, who insists, however, that the girl actually asked him to kill. Furthermore, it turns out that Li is the son of a very powerful man, Chairman Cheng-Wen Li,...
- 4/5/2022
- by Panos Kotzathanasis
- AsianMoviePulse
Taiwan’s Studio76 is joining hands with Singapore’s MediaCorp launch a new script competition to be launched in 2021. The mission is to boost Chinese-language storytelling in the pan-Asia region.
Unveiled at the Taiwan Creative Content Fest, “Rising Stories” will begin accepting applications from Feb. 1, 2021 to April 15, 2021. Five winners will be selected, and results are expected to be announced in July. The script competition also has backing of Tencent’s WeTV and X Media Asia.
The competition aims to strengthen Taiwan as an incubation hub for Chinese language stories for talent from all over the world, and to create projects with global appeal that can attract investment from international financiers, Studio76 said.
Entries will be judged by a panel of adjudicators including actor Janel Tsai, director Chieh Hsueh-Bin, director Lester Shih (“The Bridge Curse”), scriptwriter-producer Maya Huang and Wang Li-Wen (“The Magnificent Bobita”).
Speaking Thursday at Tccf, judges said they were excited with the competition,...
Unveiled at the Taiwan Creative Content Fest, “Rising Stories” will begin accepting applications from Feb. 1, 2021 to April 15, 2021. Five winners will be selected, and results are expected to be announced in July. The script competition also has backing of Tencent’s WeTV and X Media Asia.
The competition aims to strengthen Taiwan as an incubation hub for Chinese language stories for talent from all over the world, and to create projects with global appeal that can attract investment from international financiers, Studio76 said.
Entries will be judged by a panel of adjudicators including actor Janel Tsai, director Chieh Hsueh-Bin, director Lester Shih (“The Bridge Curse”), scriptwriter-producer Maya Huang and Wang Li-Wen (“The Magnificent Bobita”).
Speaking Thursday at Tccf, judges said they were excited with the competition,...
- 11/19/2020
- by Vivienne Chow
- Variety Film + TV
Starry Starry Night Trailer, Poster, Photo. Tom Lin‘s Starry Starry Night (2011) movie trailer, movie poster, movie photo stars Rene Liu, Harlem Yu, Kenneth Tsang, Kenneth Tsang, Hui Ming Lin, and Janel Tsai. Starry Starry Night‘s plot synopsis: “Starry Starry Night is the slightly fantastical tale of Mei, a 13-years old girl trying to deal with growing [...]
Continue reading: Starry Starry Night (2011) Movie Trailer, Poster, Photo: Tom Lin...
Continue reading: Starry Starry Night (2011) Movie Trailer, Poster, Photo: Tom Lin...
- 5/22/2012
- by Rollo Tomasi
- Film-Book
Director: Rico Chung.
Writer: Lan Yang.
Cast: Jordan Chan, Yang Mi, Hayama Hiro, Janel Tsai, Maggie Lee, Mini Yang, Shaun Tam, Wong Yau Nam, Tsui Tin Yau, Jessica Xu and Anya.
Not to be confused with other similarly titled products, this latest incarnation of Mysterious Island comes from China and involves the paranormal. Game contestants, as reported by the fictional TV show "Search Planet," are taken to a remote piece of rock on the Binlusai Island chain for a final round of "Survivor." But no one in the group knows about the land’s dark past; it was once the home to a leper colony.
But after the transport gets damaged as they approach land, everyone, including the show hostess Stanley (Jessica Xu) and cameraman Ken (Shaun Tam), have to do more than to fend for themselves.
Greed overcomes the eight people, show creators excluded, who think nothing of their plight.
Writer: Lan Yang.
Cast: Jordan Chan, Yang Mi, Hayama Hiro, Janel Tsai, Maggie Lee, Mini Yang, Shaun Tam, Wong Yau Nam, Tsui Tin Yau, Jessica Xu and Anya.
Not to be confused with other similarly titled products, this latest incarnation of Mysterious Island comes from China and involves the paranormal. Game contestants, as reported by the fictional TV show "Search Planet," are taken to a remote piece of rock on the Binlusai Island chain for a final round of "Survivor." But no one in the group knows about the land’s dark past; it was once the home to a leper colony.
But after the transport gets damaged as they approach land, everyone, including the show hostess Stanley (Jessica Xu) and cameraman Ken (Shaun Tam), have to do more than to fend for themselves.
Greed overcomes the eight people, show creators excluded, who think nothing of their plight.
- 1/4/2012
- by noreply@blogger.com (Ed Sum)
- 28 Days Later Analysis
“Mysterious Island” from director Chung Kai Cheung (who worked on “A-1 Headline” with Gordon Chan) is probably best described as a supernaturally themed thriller, though this may be pushing things a bit due to some of the film’s more bewildering elements. Headlined by Hong Kong star Jordan Chan and rising Chinese idol Mini Yang, the film has a supporting cast that includes Hayama Hiro (recently in the awesome “Sex and Zen: Extreme Ecstasy”), Shaun Tam, and Wong Yau Nam and Tsui Tin Yau of Shine fame, with impressive eye candy in the form of Janel Tsai, Maggie Lee, Jessica Xu, and Anya. Perhaps due to films of its type being increasingly rare in Chinese cinema, the film was a huge hit at the Mainland box office, managing to stand proudly alongside high profile summer blockbuster releases like “Wu Xia” and other big budget epics. The flimsy plot follows a...
- 9/4/2011
- by James Mudge
- Beyond Hollywood
I have no idea what in the hell is going on in this clip, but truth be told, that’s exactly why I want to see Kai Cheung Chung’s “Mysterious Island”. If nothing else, at least the marketing campaign stays true to the picture’s title. I’m sure we’ll see a full trailer before long, as the film, which stars Jordan Chan, Mi Yang, Tien You Tsui, Hayama Go, Janel Tsai, and Anya, opens on July 8th, 2011. You can feast your eyes on the strangeness below. To prevent further confusion, here’s a synopsis: A group of young people from different countries head to a deserted island for a survivor competition. The winner who lives through the hardships will be awarded with a big cash prize. However this journey turns out to be much harder than they could stand. First, their maps are gone. Then the competitors are being murdered,...
- 6/3/2011
- by Todd Rigney
- Beyond Hollywood
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