A friendship blossoms despite adult interference in Will You Still Be My Friend, a film coming from Taiwan. Jasper (Aloysius Looi) is Singaporean Taiwanese, moving to the latter country for a solar power business. His dad explains to his mom “They talk a lot, but in the end, they just want money”, quickly reassuring her. Thankfully, some of the children don’t adapt to adult behaviour that can have some toxic tendencies. For example, there’s Jun (Jaden Wang), who, sometimes, helps his grandmother (Lu Yi-Ching) with chores.

Part of the fictionalized context of Will You Still Be My Friend are the protests against Jasper’s parents’ solar panels. Some citizens notice that Jasper’s family’s solar project disrupts the town’s fishing industry. Despite that, Jun befriends Jasper, both taking breaks from family meetings where all the adults do is discuss work. He also stops his friends from making too much fun of Jasper while juggling both, mostly seeing Jasper in secret. Still, the grownup world weighs down on the two boys, which threatens to destroy their friendship.

Despite being just boys, or maybe because of it, the film carefully builds a complex world around them. This world building happens more around Jun, who is taller and more mature than the other boys. Will You Still Be My Friend also shows that he’s the small fishing town’s chief’s (Lung Tien-hsiang) grandson. His friendship with Jasper is real, but maybe Jasper’s parents push for that friendship for other reasons. Similarly, Jun’s position in the town means that the other boys don’t push back against his ‘strange’ actions.

But even with all this world building Will You Still Be My Friend is still about these two boys. Their penultimate argument scene is so heartbreaking that viewers will want them to stop arguing and make up.