Made as Taiwan’s economy took off in the 1960s, Early Train from Taipei is a classic country-to-city melodrama of development. To save her bankrupt rural family, Xiulan takes the train to Taipei to earn money. Boyfriend Huotu is horrified to find she has been tricked into becoming a dancer in a nightclub when he visits, and tries to persuade her to leave the next morning on the early train from Taipei. Tragedy piles upon tragedy in this cautionary tale, which touched a nerve with audiences and inspired a raft of sequels.

The film takes place after the July 7th Incident. A mysterious man in black appears in Shanghai under the Japanese rule. He assassinates the commander and senior generals of the Japanese Army Corps as well as the traitor Hu Fei. The Japanese female spy Yoshiko Kawashima was unable to determine who the mysterious man in black was. In order to reveal the identity of him, she pretended to be the No. 7 intelligence agent.