North American Premiere
Huo Meng’s film folds a grand historical reckoning into the story of one rural Chinese family. The year is 1991, and changes are coming for the Li clan: A new wave of modernization looms over their village, which has long sustained itself through wheat farming. Our protagonist is Chuang (Wang Sheng), a gifted young boy who loves his great-grandmother (Zhang Yanrong), aunt (Zheng Chuwen), and disabled cousin (Zhu Haotian). Promised advancement but faced with cruelty and prejudice, each generation of the Li family must reckon with the cost of reforming their traditional way of life.
As Living the Land progresses, its thematic reach expands and the film grows in dramatic force, inviting comparison with the works of Chinese masters Jia Zhangke and Tian Zhuangzhuang, as well as with John Ford’s historical family saga How Green Was My Valley. Visually rich, finely detailed, and large in ambition, this is a powerfully assertive work.
Silver Bear for Best Director, Berlinale 2025
Media Partner
Wang Shang, Zhang Yanrong, Zhang Chuwen
China
2025
In Mandarin with English subtitles
Animal cruelty
At International Village
At Fifth Avenue
Book Tickets
Credits & Director
Executive Producer
Xu Chunping, Yao Chen
Producer
Zhang Fan
Screenwriter
Huo Meng
Cinematography
Guo Daming
Editor
Huo Meng
Original Music
Wan Jianguo
Huo Meng
Huo Meng was born in 1984 in Taikang, Henan Province, China. Starting out as a law student at the Communication University of China, he later embarked on a master’s degree in cinema at the same institution. In 2018, he released his first fiction feature, Crossing the Border – Zhaoguan, which won the Pingyao International Film Festival Fei Mu Award for Best Director and the Fajr International Film Festival Best Asian Director award. The film also received a Best Director nomination at the Golden Rooster Film Festival.
Filmography: Crossing the Border – Zhaoguan (2018)
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