Turn Left, Turn Right 2003

In a quiet city, two people live in buildings that touch at a thin wall, always near but never seeing each other. John Liu is a violinist who slides from one job to the next, chasing melodies and steady work. During a gig, he meets Beatrice Hsu as June, a bold and flirtatious woman who offers him a ride home. Her direct charm unsettles him, and he bolts from the car, sprinting toward the safety of his own building. The next day he sees her waiting at the left corner of the block, and a simple fear of being cornered by her makes him avoid that side of the building entirely, a small wariness that tugs at him every time he steps outside.

Eve Choi is a translator at a bustling book publishing house, tasked with turning a chilling horror novel into Chinese. Night after night she works, chasing the rhythm of unfamiliar phrases and the creeping sense that the story might bleed into her own apartment. The hours grow tense as she translates, and she begins to worry that the walls around her might be listening. By day, she notices a menacing tree to the right side of her building and resolves to keep to the left, convinced that the right may harbor something she doesn’t want to invite in.

The two lives converge in a park, where a fountain becomes a small, shared memory. John Liu helps Eve Choi recover papers that have fallen into the water, and they realize they had crossed paths once before, when they were younger during a school field trip to an amusement park. Eve had asked for John’s number back then, but a train incident sent her bag away and erased the contact. They exchange numbers again, the moment electric with possibility, but they do not share names, and the rain clouds roll in before they can pause to introduce themselves properly.

That night they are buoyed by the chance of rekindled fate, but the next morning brings a brutal slap of illness. Both catch a harsh flu from the rainstorm, and the clock in their bodies ticks with a heavy ache. John’s medication—expired—sits on a shelf, while Eve forgets to take hers in the rush of day-to-day life. The next day, the rain has wreaked further havoc on their fragile plan: the numbers on their damp papers have blurred into a muddle of unreadable digits, leaving them with only fragments to guide their calls. Each tries several combinations, hoping to reach the other, grasping at luck in a quiet, anxious way.

One of the scattered numbers leads to a restaurant where Lam Suet plays the Restaurant Owner. When Terri Kwan arrives with a delivery, she spots the two feverish, hopeful figures and quickly pieces together that they are both trying to reach someone they cannot quite name. She becomes a bridge of sorts, offering a practical distraction to John when she notices how close he is to missing a missed connection. To divert him from the awkward truth, she spins a story about an old lady living in the neighboring apartment, a harmless lie meant to give him something to focus on besides the stubborn wall that keeps two people apart.

The fever deepens into a hospital visit. Edmund Chen appears as Dr. Hu, a former university classmate of Eve who carries a quiet crush for her. He insists on giving Eve the best care possible, and his professional calm is shadowed by a personal longing that complicates his judgment. He and Ruby—the patient, resourceful helper who inspired John to see the humanity in his own loneliness—play pivotal roles as the hospital becomes a space where emotions are tested and loyalties waver. Dr. Hu makes the choice to discharge John, but Ruby’s insistence on the severity of John’s illness persuades him to rethink that decision. Before leaving, John and Eve entrust their home keys to Ruby and Dr. Hu so that voicemail can catch any future message from the other.

After discharge, the cruel irony reveals itself: Dr. Hu and Ruby have moved into each of John and Eve’s apartments. Neither John nor Eve wants the two intruders in a life they are trying to rebuild, and heartbreak paves the way for a rash, impulsive decision. Dr. Hu and Ruby, wounded in love and seeking solace, decide to be together, a small act of a larger revenge against the couple who can’t quite find each other. They mail photographs showing all the places they had missed in the pursuit, a bittersweet catalog that stings two people who are still counting missing numbers rather than cherished moments. John and Eve confront them, but the attempt to test the others’ feelings by passing along phone numbers does not spark the reaction they hoped for; neither pair makes the call they fear they might never get to make.

With frustration mounting, John and Eve resolve to pursue opportunities abroad, hoping distance might sharpen their focus and clear a path to one another. But on the day they are set to leave Taiwan, an earthquake shakes the city and tears down the wall that has kept them apart. In the shaking, the barrier that has defined their daily lives collapses, and the two finally spot one another across the newly revealed space. The long separation ends, and fate—persistent and patient—finally allows them to reach out, bridging the final distance that had kept them from a shared future.