This film is Chen Kaige's masterpiece. Although he would eventually direct the more financially successful Devil on the Doorstep (another great Kaige film), this one packs more emotional wallop. The cinematography is very impressive, and led to the emergence of Zhang Yimou as China's greatest filmmaker of all time in the later 80s and all of the 90. A picture is worth a thousand words, and this film shows why. The story unfolds because of images, not because of dialogue.
The only other films of great note before this one, that showed the effects of poverty in China were Spring in a Small Village and San Mao (Three Hairs). Most other Chinese films were filled with excessive CCP dialogue extolling the virtues of socialism. It is much better to show it than to speak it.
Gu Quing plays the CCP soldier who works as a propagandist for village folk song research, and Ba Xue plays the young girl, who is sold into indentured slavery by ancient Chinese cultural traditions. The soldier affects both her and her younger brother. I will not reveal the outcome of these relationships, as it would spoil your enjoyment of the film. One of the best 150 Chinese films ever made, and probably in the top ten.
Gu Quing - The Soldier(as Xueyin Wang)
Bai Xue - The Young Farmgirl.
