Shangjun Cai

Shenzhen businessman, Da Ming, goes home to Beijing when he thinks his father has died. He finds his father hard at work at the family's bathhouse (the false message was a ruse of Da's mentally-handicapped, exuberant brother, Er Ming, to get Da home). Da stays a couple days, observing his father being social director, marriage counselor, and dispute mediator for his customers and a boon companion to Er... (imdb)

Relationship between father and son on a background of Maoist regime in China in the mid-20th century. The father, a painter by profession, interned in a labor camp for "re-education" and loses his ability to paint. he teaches his son to draw, but does so obsessively. The convoluted relationship between father and son that spread over the period of childhood, adolescence and maturity of the son are being resolved in a surprising and sensitive way.

Inspired by a true crime story, this bold and unsettling revenge film takes a road trip down the dark corners of modern Chinese society. Surveying the moral debris of the country's economic growth, director Cai Shangjun lays the foundations for a new Chinese neorealism. (tiff.net)

'Aiqing mala tang' ('Spicy Love Soup') starts with a young couple eating sweet (or sour) and spicy soup from a two-sided bowl shaped in a Yin and Yang pattern. Until the couple's wedding at the end of the film, 'Aiqing mala tang' intermittently shows six different episodes about different generations' relationships. (imdb)