Lacuna 2012

Shen Wei [Shawn Yue Man-Lok] and Tong Xin [Zhang Jingchu] wake up together in a furniture store bed after a night of heavy drinking, with no memory of how they ended up there or who the other person is. They part in a rush, each trying to make sense of the fragments of the night before, while the city outside hums with a stubborn fog of confusion and chance.

Wei quickly discovers that his Audi is gone, and so is his friend “White Hair.” The day only gets stranger when they start seeing internet videos that feature Wei, Xin, and Mei Qiqi [Mia Yam], a famous actress, all tied to the events of the previous night. The footage doesn’t answer questions so much as raise them, leaving Wei and Xin to piece together their actions from blurred, glamorous fragments and the escalating stakes around a large cash sum.

Xin cannot explain what happened to three hundred thousand US dollars that were meant as a bribe from her boss, a film director, to Mei Qiqi, intended to end the director’s relationship with the actress and to silence her. The money becomes a ticking clock in their minds, a symbol of what might be at risk if they don’t retrace their steps and uncover who’s truly controlling the night’s chaos.

A police call about a missing pet pulls Wei and his so-called “girlfriend” back into a tangled web of clues. They must both come to claim the animal, leading them to Mei Qiqi’s wallet at an upscale bar, where staff greet them by name as if they’ve already spent a fortune and earned VIP treatment—volumes of money spent, apparently, totaling around $90,000. The odd detour takes them to a rather unusual police station, where the mystery deepens rather than clarifies.

There, they learn that their pet allegedly ate apples from a store, and the creature turns out to be an alpaca. The sergeant hints that Xin had promised to deliver the animal to her boss, and that without the money the plan would fail. When they deliver the alpaca to the director and suggest it came from Mei Qiqi, the director uses the moment to pull Wei, Xin, and Mei Qiqi into a scene from a Nativity set he’s filming, blurring truth and fiction even further in a way only cinema could justify.

A text message to Wei sends them to another club, where they run into Pupi, the lead singer of the club’s band, who has been texting them all day, and a man named Choize. Choize’s two thugs drag them into a car for questioning, searching for a place called Maria’s where she disappeared with them the night before. Maria, Xin recalls, is the frog that jumped from her purse in the morning, a surreal image that underscores how reality and performance have become inseparable in this night of mayhem.

Xin is held hostage while Wei returns to her apartment to recover the frog, and the memory fragments begin to rain down around them. Xin’s recollection then points them to a construction site where they had earlier traveled in search of money. They revisit the place and discover an apartment filled with sculpted furniture—an installation Wei created to comfort Xin after a breakup, a tableau of building materials transformed into art that somehow captures the mood of their fragile alliance.

Ticket stubs from a drive-in cinema lead them to Wei’s car, and in the trunk they unexpectedly find Wei’s missing friend and Mei Qiqi tucked away in the back, locked inside. Mei Qiqi believes the money has already vanished, but Wei’s ally White Hair hands them another baggage claim token, sparking a frantic race to recover the missing item. They finally locate Xin’s bag containing $180,000.

As the tension eases into a cautious calm, Wei and Xin exchange phone numbers and, in a quiet montage, the film reveals the night in a new light: the two had wandered into the furniture store by accident, finding an unlocked door and discovering a world where memory, desire, and the lure of fame collide in a single, unforgettable evening.