I was a little skeptical before viewing this film as to whether director Feng Xiao Gang could pull off a theme that literally begs to be a cinematic spectacle of special effects. I had the impression they would add surround speakers all around the theatre to give us that sensurround earth shaking experience.
Feng did none of that. Instead, he gives us a masterfully crafted story of a mother's love torn between saving only one of her son or daughter, born as twins, trapped under the same pillar during the devastating earthquake of Tangshan in 1976. She chooses to save her son. She tearfully hugs her daughter she thinks is already dead in an emotional farewell before leaving with her son for a safe medical shelter. The repercussion of that fateful decision has a profound emotional effect on the mother and her siblings.
Unable to overcome the guilty conscience of her decision, the remorseful mother lives a life of self-imposed solitude in a small house in Tangshan, afraid to move out because she thinks her daughter's soul may not find her again, and also for her husband who died saving her life in the earthquake.
Unknowingly to the mother, her daughter, given up for dead and laid beside her dead father, wakes up from her unconscious coma state. Traumatized and shocked by her mother's decision, she stood up and wonders about aimlessly on the street laid with corpses. The feeling of being totally abandoned must have strike right through her fragile heart as she is dumbed and unable to talk for a long time. A kind couple from the army decides to adopt her. Slowly, she regains her confidence and her speech, but the anger and bitterness remain etched deep in her heart. She grows up without ever wanting to look for her mother again. To her, the memory of her mother giving the only persimmon left on the plate to her brother on the night the earthquake hits is yet another sign that her mother favours son over her. Even the promise by her mother to buy her more persimmons the next day does nothing to dispel that suspicion.
Many years later, in 2008, the Sichuan earthquake produces another tragedy on a massive scale. Brother and sister are there as volunteers. There, at a rest point, she hears a man, who turns out to be her brother, recounting his mother's anguish about having to choose between saving either son or daughter in the 1976 Tangshan earthquake. It is then that she realizes that her mother feels equally painful about losing her than she is bitter about being given up in favour of her brother.
The act of forgiveness and reconciliation between mother and daughter comes at the end in a highly charged emotional climax. As she enters her mother's home, right on the table below the portraits of herself and her dead father, is a plate full of persimmons. Her mother tells her she still remembers to buy the persimmons she has promised her. Tears flowed freely from my eyes watching this scene.
Feng did none of that. Instead, he gives us a masterfully crafted story of a mother's love torn between saving only one of her son or daughter, born as twins, trapped under the same pillar during the devastating earthquake of Tangshan in 1976. She chooses to save her son. She tearfully hugs her daughter she thinks is already dead in an emotional farewell before leaving with her son for a safe medical shelter. The repercussion of that fateful decision has a profound emotional effect on the mother and her siblings.
Unable to overcome the guilty conscience of her decision, the remorseful mother lives a life of self-imposed solitude in a small house in Tangshan, afraid to move out because she thinks her daughter's soul may not find her again, and also for her husband who died saving her life in the earthquake.
Unknowingly to the mother, her daughter, given up for dead and laid beside her dead father, wakes up from her unconscious coma state. Traumatized and shocked by her mother's decision, she stood up and wonders about aimlessly on the street laid with corpses. The feeling of being totally abandoned must have strike right through her fragile heart as she is dumbed and unable to talk for a long time. A kind couple from the army decides to adopt her. Slowly, she regains her confidence and her speech, but the anger and bitterness remain etched deep in her heart. She grows up without ever wanting to look for her mother again. To her, the memory of her mother giving the only persimmon left on the plate to her brother on the night the earthquake hits is yet another sign that her mother favours son over her. Even the promise by her mother to buy her more persimmons the next day does nothing to dispel that suspicion.
Many years later, in 2008, the Sichuan earthquake produces another tragedy on a massive scale. Brother and sister are there as volunteers. There, at a rest point, she hears a man, who turns out to be her brother, recounting his mother's anguish about having to choose between saving either son or daughter in the 1976 Tangshan earthquake. It is then that she realizes that her mother feels equally painful about losing her than she is bitter about being given up in favour of her brother.
The act of forgiveness and reconciliation between mother and daughter comes at the end in a highly charged emotional climax. As she enters her mother's home, right on the table below the portraits of herself and her dead father, is a plate full of persimmons. Her mother tells her she still remembers to buy the persimmons she has promised her. Tears flowed freely from my eyes watching this scene.