Preparation for the Next Life

"Love isn’t an escape, it’s a reason to keep going."

2025 1h 56m EN

😐

5.9

MID

★5.9TMDB · 31

DramaRomance

Synopsis

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Aishe, a Uyghur woman trained by her military father, migrates to New York City where she finds herself laboring in Chinatown’s underground kitchens. She fatefully encounters Skinner, a young American soldier who has just returned from three tours in the Middle East. While falling in love, they discover the possibility of a better life together than the ones they believed they were destined to live alone.

“Love isn’t an escape, it’s a reason to keep going.”

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Cast

Sebiye Behtiyar
Aishe
Fred Hechinger
Skinner
Landyn Lu
Munro
Ella Rouwen Chen
Chen
B. Todd Johnston
Jim
Maxwell Almono
Luis
Justin Cotta
Cop (Times Square)
Alicher Adill
Aziz

Credits

Behind the camera

Director: Bing Liu
Writers: Martyna Majok
Languages: Mandarin, English, Uighur
Countries: United States of America

Want more? Switch to Cinephile mode in the header for DP, composer, budget, box office, production companies, keywords, and release history.

Did you know?

Fun facts 🍿

1 / 8

ERA

Did you know

Released last year.

MoodPlayr · trivia#01

2 / 8

WORLD

Did you know

Dialogue crosses 3 languages: Mandarin, English, Uighur.

MoodPlayr · trivia#02

3 / 8

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Directed by Bing Liu, shot by Ante Cheng. Note their partnership — DPs and directors often return to each other across a career.

MoodPlayr · trivia#03

4 / 8

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Original score by Emile Mosseri. Worth a dedicated listen after — most great films lose half their impact without the score.

MoodPlayr · trivia#04

5 / 8

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Editor Anne McCabe shaped the rhythm. On an edit-heavy film, the editor does more to control your pulse than the director.

MoodPlayr · trivia#05

6 / 8

CAST

Did you know

Sebiye Behtiyar and Fred Hechinger and Landyn Lu carry the top of the cast.

MoodPlayr · trivia#06

7 / 8

FACT

Did you know

Marketing tagline: "Love isn’t an escape, it’s a reason to keep going.".

MoodPlayr · trivia#07

8 / 8

WILD

Did you know

IMDB entry: tt31727191 — still the authoritative cross-reference for credits and trivia.

MoodPlayr · trivia#08

Cinephile deep dive

The take

Bing Liu directs. Ante Cheng behind the camera. Emile Mosseri scores. Anne McCabe cuts. Produced in United States of America. Dialogue in Mandarin, English, Uighur.

Trivia

Things worth knowing

1Released last year.
2Dialogue crosses 3 languages: Mandarin, English, Uighur.
3Directed by Bing Liu, shot by Ante Cheng. Note their partnership — DPs and directors often return to each other across a career.
4Original score by Emile Mosseri. Worth a dedicated listen after — most great films lose half their impact without the score.
5Editor Anne McCabe shaped the rhythm. On an edit-heavy film, the editor does more to control your pulse than the director.
6Sebiye Behtiyar and Fred Hechinger and Landyn Lu carry the top of the cast.
7Marketing tagline: "Love isn’t an escape, it’s a reason to keep going.".
8IMDB entry: tt31727191 — still the authoritative cross-reference for credits and trivia.
9Only 31 TMDB ratings — you're getting ahead of the curve on this one.

The technical file

Cinematography: Ante Cheng
Original score: Emile Mosseri
Editing: Anne McCabe
Production design: Kelly McGehee
Costume design: Keri Langerman
Makeup / hair: Julia Lallas
VFX supervisor: Yuval Levy
Sound: Gene Park
Stunt coordinator: Scott Burik
Runtime: 116 min · 1h 56m
Aspect ratio (typical): 1.37:1 (Academy)
Status: Released
Box office: $43,421
Original language: EN
Certification (US): R
IMDB: Preparation for the Next Life (2025)

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Bing Liu

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Community reviews

What people are saying

Brent Marchant2025-10-01
★ 4/10
An essential element of any love story is chemistry between the lead characters, even if it takes an unconventional form. Regrettably, however, that’s exactly what’s missing in director Bing Liu’s debut narrative feature, based on the novel by Atticus Lish. Told in the form of a narrated letter/journal entry to her late film, the film chronicles the unlikely love story of Aishe (Sebiye Behtiyar), an ambitious, sharp-witted twentysomething Uyghur woman who illegally immigrates to the US, and Skinner (Fred Hechinger), a troubled young American soldier who just returned stateside after three tours of duty in the Middle East and is now apparently unsuccessfully battling PTSD. They meet by chance in New York, where Aishe toils to make ends meet working long hours in a Chinatown restaurant and Skinner tries to sort out his life and his mental state. Together they embark on a rollercoaster romance with a series of breakups and reconciliations as Aishe tries to decide on marriage or a life of solitude, peace of mind and independence, all the while staying ahead of immigration authorities, and Skinner seeks to find a stable existence that may or may not involve the love of his life, depending on his mood, focus and ever-changing inclinations for a steady, traditional relationship. To be honest, the basic premise behind this release is inherently something of a stretch, made worse by a narrative that becomes meandering and redundant after a time. But the bigger issue here is that I never bought the sincerity of the connection between the protagonists, right from the moment they met and at virtually every turn during the course of their on-again/off-again partnership. The reason? Despite her inexperience with romance, Aishe seems far too smart and determined to chart the course of her life to put up with Skinner’s unpredictability and capriciousness. In fact, after their first emotionally tense confrontation, I was astounded by their subsequent reconciliation, given that she seems like the type who would have walked away and not looked back without a second thought. Granted, an immigration-driven marriage might resolve some of the issues of her legal status in the US, but with Skinner? It’s true that she has an apparently deep sense of compassion for his condition, but, being the fiercely headstrong individual that she is, I can’t see that empathy being enough in itself to make her want to stay with him on a long-term basis. What’s more, Aishe’s back story often feels incomplete, and Skinner’s is even more nonexistent, an aspect of the story that makes their actions and responses all the more perplexing at times. In all, this offering is half-baked and implausible across the board, making for a screen romance that’s unengaging and unrealistic, one not worth the time.

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