Jiqun Liu

"Lianhua Symphony" - a small collection, consisting of eight short films shot in 1937 by young filmmakers Shanghai Lianhua Film Company. Part 1: Two Yuans (兩毛錢) directed by Situ Huimin / Part 2: Nightmares in Spring Chamber (春閨斷夢) directed by Fei Mu / Part 3: The Stranger (陌生人) directed by Tan Youliu / Part 4: Three Friends (三人行) directed by Shen Fu / Part 5: Landscape Under the Moonlight (月下小景) directed by He Mengfu / Part 6: The Ghost (鬼) directed by Zhu Shilin / Part 7: Rhapsody of a Madman (瘋人狂想曲) directed by Sun Yu / Part 8: Five Little Brothers (小五義) directed by Cai Chusheng

The film tells the story of Yang Naifan (Ruan Lingyu) who runs from her arranged marriage to be with her true love, Li Zuyi (Jin Yan). The film details the poverty she must endure for breaking with tradition.

A Chinese couple in the 1930s struggle to survive. Things get complicated for them when he enlists to fight the war against Japan.

An upper-class son of urbane landowners falls in love with a peasant girl. When a pregnancy results, the couple are kept apart by strict societal morays.

In 1930, two sisters from the countryside, the serious Zhang Lan (Ruan Lingyu) and the frivolous Zhang Tao graduate from the secondary school where their mother Zhang Jie serves as principal. They both love their cousin Zuo, but have ambitions other than marriage. Their lives change dramatically when both attend university in Shanghai and encounter modern urban life and rapidly changing society. The film also depicts the emergence of Chiang Kai-shek's 1934 New Life Movement. Lianhua Film Studio did the film to appease the Nationalist Party which accused it of primarily presenting left-wing films, which was true.

A country girl and her boyfriend arrive in Shanghai for a better life. They soon find only desperation. She is raped and falls into prostitution as he drifts into revolutionary circles. Her access through her trade grants her greater access which she uses to aid her revolutionary lover with tragic results.

Six young men from the city take jobs building roads for the Chinese Army

This is a silent film from China made in 1931. It is about two leads in a film, Yan (Raymond King) and Ying (Violet Wong). They meet after hearing Ying sing while another movie is being shot. You, of course, don't get to hear the song, but it catches people's attention. Once they meet and work together, they fall in love. Is it forever?

A warlord's nephew lusts for farmer Song Ke's sister. When Song refuses, the whole family is thrown into jail and the sister commits suicide. The father dies of grief and Song lives with his cousin abroad. The warlord's nephew loses power and also escapes to the same country.

A wife borrows a necklace for a party, and it is subsequently stolen. Her husband embezzles funds to pay for the loss, but he is discovered and arrested.

Sister Ye lives in a rural village, where everyone makes traditional toys. When Sister Ye's husband dies of an unknown illness, and while Ye is attending to him, her son is kidnapped and sold to a wealthy lady in the city of Shanghai. Shortly after, the village is destroyed during an attack between rival warlords, forcing the villagers move to the city, where they continue to make toys. Ten years pass, and Ye's daughter Zhu'er has become a toy designer. While helping the Nationalist army at the rear, Zhu'er is killed in an attack by the Japanese. On New Year's Eve, Sister Ye is dressed in rags, sitting on the curb, selling toys. A young boy buys toys from her, and it is none other than her son, whom she does not recognize.

Ill-fated romance of an orphaned flower girl and a young musician, destroyed by his traditional family and the Shanghai underworld.

A wild country girl moves to Shanghai with her painter boyfriend and experiences exploitation and poverty.

Young sprinter Lin Ying enrolls in a sports college in Shanghai. As she becomes a sports celebrity, she starts to mangle with the upper class and has gradually forgotten the true essence of sports.

The Person in the Boudoir Dream

A 1929 B&W silent comedy from Shanghai, describing a vindictive funnyman's efforts to get back at his cheating wife, as aided by his smarter and more moralistic young son.

This movie is based on the famous Chinese folklore that is more than one and a half millennium old. The same folklore was what the Disney animation Mulan is based on, and similarly, it was what many Chinese movies/operas/plays based on.

This film depicting the lives of ordinary people — street peddlers, poor scholars, and young revolutionaries — reflects the culturally progressive political climate of that pre-War, post-May the 4th era.

Bai Le De and Hu Lun tung are military cadets. After graduating, Hu Lin Tung is appointed captain of Guangdong headquarters and goes away. Later, Bae Le De is also appointed to a post at the same place. Hu Lun Ting falls in love with Luo Hua, daughter of the local commander.

To please his dying father, Hong Yu, a college student, is forced to abandon his girlfriend, Little Hong, and marry his cousin, with disastrous results.

The entaglement of a deserted child Qiling who start to work for his biological father Menghua’s construction company 24 years later.