AllMovie

A teenage pregnancy leads to a lifetime of doubt and condemnation for a young Chinese woman struggling to find her place in a male-dominated society in the sophomore feature from Fish and Elephant director Li Yu. Yun (Liu Yiran) is stigmatized for life after a brief love affair results in pregnancy at the tender age of 16, and her shameful secret is forever hushed when her mother induces labor in a desperate attempt to cover the pregnancy up. In the decade that follows, the shamed Yun still carries the burden of her past sins, and as the whispers of suspicious neighbors persist, the Sichuan Opera-trained performer squanders her talents by performing with a local musical troupe. Though the cold manipulation and deep-rooted cruelty of the men she entertains slowly erodes Yun's view of the opposite sex, the protective, youthful affection expressed toward her by her mother's ten-year-old student Xiao-yong (Huang Xingrao) shows her that even beneath society's scorn the warmth of human emotion can still radiate.