To live (2003)

Fugui's changing fortunes lead him from a landowning household through civil war and decades of life under Communist rule. The test of successive campaigns becomes their effect on food, work, illness and family care. A direct, compact counterpoint to the larger political panoramas here, devastating in its repeated losses. Yu Hua keeps the voice rooted in a particular survivor, letting endurance expose the distance between historical slogans and an ordinary day's demands.