May & August (2002)
Directed by Raymond To
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Synopsis by Ryan Shriver
Set during one of the most notorious battles of the Sino-Japanese War, Raymond To's war drama May & August focuses on two siblings struggling to survive the 1937 Japanese invasion of Nanjing. As the Japanese Army began its seige of the then Chinese capital of Nanjing, the invading troops supposedly (an assertion strenuously and nearly universally denied by Japanese officials and historians) instituted a massive slaughter that numbered anywhere from tens to hundreds of thousands of surrendered Chinese soldiers and civilians. Caught in the middle of the campaign are young May and her little sister August, who are quickly orphaned when their father is executed and their mother is raped and killed. Despite the best efforts of family members who managed to escape the city prior to the Japanese occupation, the girls are sent to a refugee camp and are forced to endure relying only on themselves.
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Keywords
orphan, refugee-camp, sister, war