Last Night in Taipei has a strong premise, focusing on a group of friends who reunite by chance one night in the city. Despite a noteworthily strong soundtrack, courtesy of underground electronic music producer Sonia Calico, the movie is less than the sum of its parts.
At the start of the film, Blanche runs into her ex-boyfriend, Jake, in Taipei’s Cinema Park after an argument with her husband. Jake invites her to a drink and, to his own surprise, Blanche agrees.The two head to a bar where their mutual friend, Axin, works. The three are united by the fact that they were all aspiring actors at one point in time, even if Jake and Blanche have since given up on that ambition.
Axin’s girlfriend, Mao Mao, joins the trio soon after. But, as it quickly emerges, Mao Mao is not actually dating Axin. Instead, Axin, as an actor, has been hired by Mao Mao to act as her fake boyfriend after a recent break-up, in the hopes of making her ex jealous.
Movies about chance reunions are, for better or worse, a dime a dozen. While the focus on a group of former aspiring actors could have lent the movie some uniqueness, Last Night in Taipei is light on details relating to the challenges of acting. Though the movie eventually reveals that its protagonists’ relationships are not what they may initially seem, this occurs without much in the way of foreshadowing. As such, the film instead comes off as a series of surprises that do not seem deserved. .
Indeed, the biggest weakness of Last Night in Taipei is probably its script— which viewers might otherwise expect to be its strongest element, given its characters do little else except drink and talk as they wander through the city. Dialogue between the four main characters is wooden, mechanical, and unnatural.
The characters’ internal monologue also tends to be stilted. Character motivations generally come off as unrealistic, as in how Jake’s continual complaints about how Taiwanese consider him a foreigner because he lives abroad do not seem to ring true to life, or Mao Mao’s outlandish plot to pay Axin to be her boyfriend.
In this sense, Last Night in Taipei is perhaps strongest when it comes to its soundtrack, which provides the movie with a sense of rhythm that it otherwise lacks. There is little else that holds the movie together.
• • •
Last Night in Taipei (Chinese: 明日的過客) — Taiwan/France. Dialog in Mandarin Chinese. Directed by Kuo Cheng-chui. Running time 1hr 27min. First released October 9, 2025 at the Vancouver International Film Festival. Starring Chen Yuu, Phil Hou, Jeff Kuo, Chi-Yun Mao, Lin Yu.
This article is part of Cinema Escapist‘s dedicated coverage of the 2026 New York Asian Film Festival. Last Night in Taipei screens July 19 at the Walter Reade Theater with a Q&A featuring director Kuo Cheng-chui.