{"id":139826,"date":"2025-11-14T17:55:21","date_gmt":"2025-11-14T17:55:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/139826\/"},"modified":"2025-11-14T17:55:21","modified_gmt":"2025-11-14T17:55:21","slug":"inside-25-year-journey-to-netflixs-acclaimed-movie","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/139826\/","title":{"rendered":"Inside 25-Year Journey to Netflix\u2018s Acclaimed Movie"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tFor Shih-Ching Tsou<\/a> and Sean Baker<\/a>, the road to making Left-Handed Girl lasted about as long as they\u2019ve known each other \u2014 which is to say, about 25 years. They met in 1999 at the New School in New York, where Tsou was a graduate student in media studies and Baker was taking editing courses after graduating from New York University. (\u201cIf my directing career doesn\u2019t pan out, what was I going to fall back on? I was like, \u2018I better get a craft under my belt,\u2019\u201d Baker says.) They bonded over a shared taste in films and told stories about their upbringing. One of Tsou\u2019s memories, from her childhood in her native Taiwan, sparked Baker\u2019s interest: Her grandfather saw her use a knife with her left hand, and told her that was the \u201cdevil\u2019s hand.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThat sense of shame and guilt always stayed with me, because I felt like I did something wrong,\u201d Tsou says now. As Baker recalls, of what intrigued him: \u201cIf a young girl suddenly thought her hand was being controlled by the devil, how would that play out? Where could we find some drama and comedy in that situation?\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tWe can flash-forward to now and see those questions were well worth asking. Left-Handed Girl, which marks Tsou\u2019s solo directorial debut (she produced and wrote the script with Baker, who also edited), premiered to rave reviews at the Cannes<\/a> Film Festival; it was acquired by Netflix<\/a> and is now Taiwan\u2019s submission for the best international<\/a> feature Oscar. But it took the pair decades to find the financing to make the movie. They\u2019d have to prove themselves again and again, with Baker directing and Tsou producing such award-winning indies as Tangerine<\/a>, The Florida Project<\/a>, and Red Rocket<\/a>. By the time Tsou could finally, officially start pre-production, Baker realized he wouldn\u2019t be able to join the shoot, as he was deep into Anora<\/a> \u2014 the film that\u2019d go on to win him four Oscars, including for best picture.<\/p>\n

\n\tSet in Taipei, Left-Handed Girl filters Tsou\u2019s initial inspiration point from her childhood through five-year-old I-Jing (Nina Ye), who\u2019s traumatized by the left-handed admonishment while also adjusting to a move back to the city with her older sister, I-Ann (Shih-Yua Ma), and mother, Chu-Fen (Janel Tsai), who runs a night-market stall. The choice to tell a rich, three-generational story of Taiwanese women honored the deeper pain that lingered for Tsou after the \u201cdevil\u2019s hand\u201d comment from her youth.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cIt\u2019s not just a left hand \u2014 it\u2019s about, you cannot be yourself, you have to hide because they want you to be like other people,\u201d Tsou says. \u201cAll the characters are part of me because, growing up in Taiwan, that\u2019s how I felt. You have a lot of restrictions, a lot of limitations and expectations put on girls especially. You have to have fair skin, you have to obey, you cannot talk back or express your emotions.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tTsou first brought Baker to Taipei in 2001. He fell in love with the city, but the scope of the movie unfolding before him \u2014 vibrantly prowling the night markets and bustling streets \u2014 did not feel achievable as they were just beginning their careers. So they co-directed the Sundance premiere Take-Out on a $3,000 budget, and then kept making movies together \u2014 with Baker honing his particular skills in areas like street casting and shooting on location. They went back to Taipei in 2010 to flesh out the script, visiting a ton of night markets in the process, and polished up a trailer to try to secure funding. They got nowhere. \u201cAsian cinema still wasn\u2019t really a big thing then, and people didn\u2019t like to watch movies with subtitles,\u201d Tsou says.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tThat dynamic changed after Red Rocket was accepted into Cannes\u2019 main competition in 2021. Before long, they were off to the races. Baker recently looked back at the first trailer he and Tsou cut together way back in 2001, in which Tsou played the mom. \u201cIt\u2019s amazing to see how the vision has been retained,\u201d he says. \u201cThe timeline isn\u2019t ideal, but the outcome is ideal.\u201d<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tNina Ye and Shih-Yua Ma in \u2018Left-Handed Girl\u2019<\/p>\n

\n\tDuring Baker\u2019s awards campaign for Anora this past winter, he settled on a theme in his victory speeches: The vitality of keeping movies in theaters, specifically with extended exclusivity windows before they launch on digital. It\u2019s notable that his first follow-up project as producer, editor, and writer has gone to Netflix, which is launching Left-Handed Girl with its customary limited two-week theatrical window (it hits Netflix on Nov. 28). Baker says Netflix\u2019s offer out of Cannes was the only one to put the movie in the black. \u201cTheir business model is streaming, so you have to accept that, and then you have to weigh your options,\u201d he says. \u201cAnd one of the most important things is to pay back your financiers, or you\u2019re not getting that opportunity again.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tAs to how he feels about the film\u2019s specific release plans? \u201cIt\u2019s Shih-Ching\u2019s solo directorial debut, and the millions of eyeballs that will be on this film because of the Netflix deal is something that she would not be able to get from traditional distribution \u2014 that\u2019s very important for her as a career launch,\u201d he says. \u201cThey\u2019re also just extremely supportive in terms of listening to us. We are striking a 35mm print for some of our theatrical screenings. They are giving us this two week window, which I think is important. I\u2019m trying to word this in a way that\u2019s diplomatic for all \u2014 and maybe with my films, yes, where I am in my career, I am simply demanding now a three-month theatrical window.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tBoth Baker and Tsou note the film has already played very well in Taiwan and around the world. \u201cPeople are celebrating it,\u201d Baker says. Tsou adds, \u201cThe response is really, really empowering.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tIt\u2019s safe to say the Netflix visibility will introduce more audiences to a significant new filmmaker, whose talent and point-of-view is evident from the ground up. Take the casting: Using what she\u2019s learned producing Baker\u2019s films for 20 years, Tsou knew to avoid casting anyone familiar. \u201cI was determined to find my own stars \u2014 I want to show fresh faces,\u201d she says. She found young Nina Ye after watching dozens of tapes via a social-media callout, while casting the sister took Tsou to Instagram. \u201cMy husband saw me doing that constantly \u2014 he said, \u2018What are you doing? Why are you looking at Taiwanese girls on Instagram?\u2019\u201d Tsou recalls with a laugh. \u201cI told him I\u2019m casting!\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tThe film culminates in a major dramatic reveal at a family gathering, with the restless energy of Left-Handed Girl building toward a wrenching climax. Baker and Tsou knew their ending before writing the beginning of the movie, but when it came to shooting it, Tsou had to get creative. Most of the extras were her mothers\u2019 actual friends. She shot documentary-style, so the four tables they had occupied could be made to look like far more. Filming the whole scene, which took three days, felt like experimental theater. \u201cWe had to close the set. The crew members had to stay out because we had four cameras shooting at the same time, circling 360,\u201d she says. \u201cThe three [lead actors] were fighting on the stage and crying \u2014 and I turned around, and all the extras at the tables were crying too. Everybody was crying together.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tBaker couldn\u2019t get to set at all. He had no idea what his longtime collaborator would deliver for her first solo movie. Then he spent a year with the Left-Handed Girl footage in the editing room, which Tsou had subtitled for him. (She also translated their original script, written in English, into the Mandarin that is spoken in the film.) \u201cSeeing the choices she made, but also being just a little bit distanced from, it allowed me to approach all the footage in a very objective way,\u201d he says. \u201cI was impressed with her coverage and her confidence in terms of her craft. She knows what she wants.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tHe was also struck by the power of the performances. \u201cSome of this cast wasn\u2019t even born when we came up with this idea,\u201d Baker says. \u201cI see it as this: It was all meant to be.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"For Shih-Ching Tsou and Sean Baker, the road to making Left-Handed Girl lasted about as long as they\u2019ve…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":139827,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[80595,47241,93,61,1042,60,270,1868,80596,2071,2072,80597,80598],"class_list":{"0":"post-139826","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-movies","8":"tag-anora","9":"tag-cannes","10":"tag-entertainment","11":"tag-ie","12":"tag-international","13":"tag-ireland","14":"tag-movies","15":"tag-netflix","16":"tag-red-rocket","17":"tag-sean-baker","18":"tag-shih-ching-tsou","19":"tag-tangerine","20":"tag-the-florida-project"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139826","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=139826"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139826\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/139827"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=139826"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=139826"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=139826"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}