Spring in a Small Town 小城之春 (1948)

Spring in a small town (1948)

Spring in a Small Town was a Chinese film released in 1948 and directed by Fei Mu (费穆). The film was based on a short story by Li Tianji (李天济), and was produced by the Wenhua Film Company.

Spring in a Small Town has been regarded as one of the masterpieces of Chinese cinema. “The film is a perfect combination of Chinese esthetics and modern cinematic technology”.

(film review by Terence Shen March 8, 2011).

It was produced in 1948, one year before the end of civil war. Because of its apparent lack of “political” grounding, Spring in a Small Town was rejected by the Communists as rightist or reactionary, and was ignored following the Communist victory in China in 1949. The film was only able to find its audience and had a resurgence in popularity after the China Film Archive made a new print in the early 1980s.

Spring in a small town (1948)

Synopsis

“Taking place in a ruined family compound after the war, the film tells the story of the once prosperous Dai family. The husband and patriarch, Dai Liyan (Shi Yu) is an invalid, and spends his days in the courtyard nostalgic for the past. His marriage to Zhou Yuwen (Wei Wei) has long been rendered loveless, though both still feel concern for the other. Liyan’s young teenage sister Dai Xiu (Zhang Hongmei), meanwhile, is too young to remember the past, and stays cheerful and playful in the ruins of her home.

Spring in a small town (1948)

Into this dreary but unchanging existence comes Liyan’s childhood friend Zhang Zhichen (Li Wei), a doctor from Shanghai and a former flame of Zhou Yuwen before she ever met her husband. The rest of the film details Zhou Yuwen’s conflicting emotions between her love for Zhang, and her loyalty to her husband and his family.”

(source : history.cultural-china.com)

Download

Spring in a Small Town is available for free download at the Internet Archive

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