The film unfortunately did not win anything at Tokyo which makes me extremely sad. This makes the film less marketable, and everyone involved less marketable, and that would be just a shame because I don’t recall the last time I became so interested in a film simply from reading a synopsis, watching the trailer, and watching the interviews from the lovely cast and crew.
The film tells the story of an intelligent girl, Shen Xingchen (Liu Dong ) as she goes from age 16 in high school to work at age 30, from 1993 to the 2008 Beijing Olympics, the most rapid times in China’s development. Throughout, the theme is an idea of is there anything everlasting in this world? Is there everlasting love? This is the question that Shen faces, along with her love, childhood friend Ming Yuan (Huang Ming). Both are scarred emotionally from the devastating ways their parents’ relationships ended and wonder whether love is worth it if eventually, it simply doesn’t last.
At first I just wanted to see this because of Huang Ming, but after watching the trailer (seriously, watch it) and reading about it, it looks so amazing, from the story to the art direction.
