Best Taiwanese drama movies
Get ready to binge. We've found a collection of must-watch drama films from Taiwan, now streaming on Netflix, HBO, Hulu, Prime Video, and other top services!
Yi Yi (2000)
Yi Yi (2000)
Each member of a family in Taipei asks hard questions about life's meaning as they live through everyday quandaries. NJ is morose: his brother owes him money, his mother-in-law is in a coma, his wife suffers a spiritual crisis when she finds her life a blank and his business partners make bad decisions.
Warriors of the Rainbow: Seediq Bale (2012)
Warriors of the Rainbow: Seediq Bale (2012)
[INTERNATIONAL VERSION] Mouna Rudo was born and raised among the Seediq people, an indigenous tribe in Taiwan, and as he grew to be a man he became a member of the Seediq Bale, a courageous band of native warriors. However, Rudo's way of life is threatened under the yoke of occupying forces from Japan, who took over the nation in 1895. As Rudo sees the traditions and honor of his people stripped away, he realizes the time has come to fight back, and in 1930 he brings together a group of former Seediq Bale soldiers, many of whom have been reduced to infighting, and molds them into a revolutionary army. Rudo and his comrades make their stand when they confront Japanese occupation troops at a youth athletic event, leading to a violent confrontation between the Seediq forces and their oppressors.
Iron Sister (1996)
Iron Sister (1996)
Manchuria 1941: Caught sleeping with his Japanese major's mistress, Manchurian collaborator Tung Fei (Jackson Liu Hsiu-hsien) fatally shoots the man and flees for his life. Overcome by fatigue after hours of travel on horseback, Tung eventually awakens to find himself under the care of hunter Suen (Dick Wei) and his daughter, Ironic (Hsu).
Secret (2007)
Secret (2007)
Ye Xiang Lun, a talented piano player is a new student at the prestigious Tamkang School. On his first day, he meets Lu Xiao Yu, a pretty girl playing a mysterious piece of music.
A City of Sadness (1989)
Artemisia (2008)
Artemisia (2008)
A woman who believes she chose an unconventional path in her life is startled to find her children are stepping further beyond society's boundaries. Ai-tsao is a widow who is nearly 60 years old; her husband, over twenty years her senior, has been dead for nearly two decades, and Ai-tsao's life has settled into a comfortable routine of looking after her elderly mother and doting on her two adult children. Ai-tsao was born into a conservative and exclusionist minority family. After falling in love with a much older teacher of mainland descent, she abandoned her family and eloped. Decades later, her discovery that her son is gay and that her daughter has a black boyfriend makes her question choices in her past.
Detention (2019)
Detention (2019)
In the 1960s, two classmates go looking for their missing friends and teachers, all of whom took part in an illegal book club, only to come face to face with ghosts and deformed monsters that have taken over their school.
The Hole (1999)
The Hole (1999)
In the final days of the year 1999, almost everyone in Taiwan has died from a strange plague that ravished the island. As rain pours down relentlessly, a single man is stuck with an unfinished plumbing job and a hole in his floor. This results in a very odd relationship with the woman who lives below him.
Starry Starry Night (2011)
Starry Starry Night (2011)
There was once a young girl named May who felt alienated from everyone around her. May is worried about her mother and father, whose marriage is on the rocks, and she yearns to return to the woods where her grandfather lives. One day, May befriends a boy as lonely as she is. When reality catches up, they run away to a beautiful world that belongs only to them. Both imaginatively escapist and heartbreakingly realistic, their journey speaks to kids and adults alike with the pain of solitude, the sorrow of loss, and the warmth of hope.
One Day (2010)
One Day (2010)
A woman is transported into a world as strange and beautiful as her dreams in this fantasy. Singing, who comes from a family of poor shopkeepers, earns her living as a cleaning woman on a ferry that services a military base. Singing has a recurring dream in which she meets a handsome stranger who speaks in language she cannot understand, and one day on the ferry she meets Tsai Hsien-tsung, a soldier who resembles the man in her dreams. The soldier is immediately smitten with Singing, and when the power goes out on the ferry, the two are thrown into a strange netherworld where they sail to South America on a deserted vessel as Singing loses her heart to the military man.
Hill of No Return (1992)
Hill of No Return (1992)
In 1920s Taiwan, Jou, a controversial woman with a tragic past, seeks to change her life after falling for a man named Che. Meanwhile, a man named Wei seeks to buy the freedom of Fumiko, a dying young woman.
The Bold, the Corrupt and the Beautiful (2017)
The Bold, the Corrupt and the Beautiful (2017)
Madame Tang colludes and mediates between the government and the private businesses for the benefits of her all-female family. One case does not go according to plan, and an entire family close to Madame Tang fall victim to a gruesome murder. Ambition, desire and lust eventually change Tang's relationships with her own family forever.
Untold Herstory (2022)
Untold Herstory (2022)
On Green Island in the 1950s, the female thought prisoners chose to fight for freedom, but were more forcefully suppressed by the authority. They held on to their beliefs and hoping for true freedom to come.
Blue Gate Crossing (2002)
Blue Gate Crossing (2002)
Yueh-chen has an obsession with her classmate Shihao, but is too shy to confess to him directly. She sends in her best friend, Kerou, to act as a go-between, and Shihao ends up falling for Kerou, who is not sure what to think of him.
7 Days in Heaven (2010)
7 Days in Heaven (2010)
"Seven Days in Heaven" covers the 7 days of the Taoist morning ritual after the death of Lin Guo Yuan (Po Tai). The movie examines the effects of his death on his children, nephew, and sister-in-law ...
18×2 Beyond Youthful Days (2024)
Taipei Story (1985)
Taipei Story (1985)
A young woman urgently seeks to navigate the maze of contemporary Taipei and find a future. She hopes that her boyfriend Lung is the key to the future, but Lung is stuck in a past that combines baseball and traditional loyalty that leads him to squander his nest egg bailing her father out of financial trouble.
The Silent Forest (2020)
The Silent Forest (2020)
Hearing-impaired teenager Chang Cheng transfers to a school for children with special needs. However, the world of the hearing-impaired doesn’t seem quiet at all. When Chang witnesses the game taking place in the last row on the school bus, his excitement about blending into a new environment immediately turns into fear.
Hear Me (2009)
Hear Me (2009)
A delivery boy falls for a young girl who is hearing impaired. Comparing themselves with water birds and trees, together they are going to break the barrier and pursuit their dreams and take their relationship to the next level.
The Lyricist Wannabe (2024)
The Lyricist Wannabe (2024)
Believing that writing Cantopop is her God-given talent, Law Wing-sze decides to make it her lifelong career. But as hard as Sze tries to polish her lyric-writing skills and expand her social circle, nothing seems to go her way. What if there’s a will, but there’s no way?
Dust in the Wind (1986)
Dust in the Wind (1986)
A-yuan and A-yun are both from the small mining town of Jio-fen. They move to Taipei, where A-yuan is an apprentice by day and goes to night school, and A-yun works as a helper at a tailors. Everyone thinks they are meant for each other, and so do they. They fail to see time and fate are beyond their control.
Nina Wu (2019)
Nina Wu (2019)
After years toiling in bit-parts, an actress finally gets her break with a leading role in a spy thriller. The part is challenging, not least because it calls for explicit sex scenes, and the director is often hard on her. But both the industry and the press think the results are sensationally good.
Three Times (2005)
Three Times (2005)
In three separate segments, set respectively in 1966, 1911, and 2005, three love stories unfold between three sets of characters, under three different periods of Taiwanese history and governance.
Spider Lilies (2007)
Spider Lilies (2007)
When Jade, a web-cam girl, visits Takeko's tattoo studio she becomes entranced with the image of the spider lily and with Takeko as well. In order to get closer to the object of her desire, Jade asks Takeko to give her the same lily tattoo, challenging Takeko's monastic existence and opening up memories which threaten to tear the two women apart.