Yijiang chunshui xiangdong liu (Spring River Flows East)

This epic, two-part political melodrama was produced in 1947 during the Chinese Civil War by the progressive Kunlun Film Studio. It was directed by the prominent leftist filmmakers Cai Chusheng and Zheng Junli, who created a box-office hit with a blend of gripping melodrama and political commentary. Surprisingly, their scathing criticism of the corrupt KMT slipped past the censors. When Japan invaded China in 1931, the idealistic teacher Zhongliang joined the national struggle, leaving his mother, wife, and son behind in Shanghai, where they were forced to fight for survival. As the turmoil of war carried him to the KMT capital of Chongqing, his idealism gave way to greedy opportunism. After the war, he returns to Shanghai, where the inevitable reunion with his destitute family confronts him with the moral dilemmas facing Chinese families and society in times of crisis.