Wanting to film The Man from Island West is the story of Ah Ming, a sinicized Atayal who returns to the village on the East Coast where he grew up, searching for personal identity. Weighed down by the disappointments of city life, he means to kill himself by driving over a cliff, but an old Atayal saves him and puts him up in a chicken shack by the river.
《西部來的人》敘述已經漢化的泰雅人阿明，回到幼年故鄉澳花村，尋找認同，都市生活的挫折讓他企圖駕車墜崖自殺，卻被同族老人救了，將他安置在河邊的雞寮。