Lost in the Stars

Lost in the Stars is a 2022 Chinese mystery crime film directed by Cui Rui and Liu Xiang, and starring Zhu Yilong, Ni Ni and Janice Man. The film is adapted from Alexey Korenev's 1990 Soviet comedy film A Trap for Lonely Man and French playwright Robert Thomas' 1960 play Trap for a Lonely Man (Piege Pour un Homme Seul). It tells the story of He Fei's wife Li Muzi who disappeared mysteriously during the wedding anniversary trip. It's a film about a story of a shocking case. The film's style have been described by some critics as "Hitchcockian". The film premiered at the Hainan International Film Festival on 25 December 2022 and released theatrically in China on 22 June 2023. Plot He Fei and his wife Li Muzi are celebrating the first anniversary of their marriage at an island resort in Barlandia, a fictional Southeast Asian country. When Muzi goes missing, the local police refuse to open an investigation, citing the lack of evidence of a crime. Two weeks later, He Fei angrily confronts the police and is thrown out of the station. However, a man named Officer Zheng, who is fluent in Chinese, expresses some sympathy towards him. He Fei wakes up the next day and finds an unknown woman in his room pretending to be Muzi. She possess a fake passport with Muzi's name. He Fei summons Officer Zheng, only to find that photographs of Muzi on his phone have been replaced with photographs of the unknown woman. Moreover, the woman knows intimate personal details that only Muzi should know. He Fei goes to a book store to find surveillance footage of his wife purchasing a book, but the footage has been replaced to include the woman instead. At a bar, He Fei sees a news segment about a successful lawyer named Chen Mai, and hires her to prove that the unknown woman is not Muzi. Chen Mai finds evidence that the unknown woman is part of a criminal group who steals the identities of wealthy men's wives. Chen Mai notices that a car is following she and He Fei around Barlandia. She leads He Fei to a hideout where they find further evidence of the group's identity theft activities. As they exit the hideout, they are pursued by a mercenary who tries to kill them with a shotgun, but they successfully escape. Chen Mai then tracks down the local photographer who took photographs of He Fei and Muzi. The photographer demands money in exchange for testifying to the police. He Fei pays the photographer.