New York-based distributor Cheng Cheng announces the North American release of “EVER SINCE WE LOVE” directed by Li Yu with a new poster and trailer. The latest collaboration between award-winning filmmaker Li Yu (Lost in Beijing, Buddha Mountain) and pop icon Fan Bingbing (I'm Not Madame Bovary, 355) will start playing in virtual cinemas in select cities on September 17th and expand in the following weeks before arriving on DVD and streaming platforms this December.
Regarded as China's prominent woman director, Li Yu had been telling stories about women on the fringe of society in her previous documentaries and narrative features recognized by film festivals in Venice, Berlinale, and Toronto. An adaption of contemporary novelist Feng Tang's semi-autobiographical best-seller “Everything Grows”, “EVER SINCE WE LOVE” marks her first attempt at a film with a male protagonist. Starring alongside Fan Bingbing, Li Meng (A Touch of Sin, Dead Pigs), and Qi Xi (So Long My Son, Calming), K-pop sensation “Super Junior's” former member Han Geng (So Young, Looking for Rohmer) plays a medical school student whose male ego constantly gets hurt by three disparate women he's attracted to.
“When people talk about Chinese women's cinema, Li Yu is a figure that can't be ignored. We recently brought the director's cut of her award-winning “BUDDHA MOUNTAIN” to VOD to celebrate its 10th anniversary. In her bigger, bolder, and more recent “EVER SINCE WE LOVE”, Li Yu continued her investigation of a hierarchical society's effects on relationships and desire. Her choice to adapt Feng Tang, a novelist widely known in China for his semi-pornographic style, has drawn the most excitement and controversy. How the female gaze she contributed clashes with the values of the original story is fascinating to watch. We can't wait to show it to the audience in North America for the first time,” stated the distributor.
Cheng Cheng founded in 2015 specializes in distributing award-winning Chinese language films in North America. The company's previous releases include Teng Congcong's acclaimed debut Send Me to the Clouds, Taiwan's Oscars entry The Great Buddha+ by Huang Hsin-Yao and Yang Chao's Berlinale Silver Bear winner Crosscurrent.
Synopsis
To Qiu Shui, a young lad in his most hungry, curious, and restless 20s, the whole world feels a little erotic. Studying at China's top medical college, he can break down men's carnal impulses with solid human anatomy knowledge but can't grasp the inner desire that draws him to three disparate romantic interests – the fairy-like hometown first love, the marriageable college girlfriend, and the sensuous working woman. It's the 1990s when China just opened up to exciting opportunities and risks. Unprecedented social fluidity provokes individuals' materialist and romantic appetites. This cruel new world eventually crushes Qiu Shui's burning passion and takes each of his lovers away. As he looks back at his chaotic youth as a grownup years later, he's rewarded with a deeper understanding of what it means to live and love. Adapting the best-selling novel “Everything Grows”, China's prominent woman director Li Yu reunites with idol Fan Bingbing to bring the female gaze to a male protagonist's story for the first time.
