To Live

Feng Yan

Release year: 2023

Run time: 90 mins

Film type: Documentary

The director of the Women's department, Fu Yongju, and her husband, an unlicensed doctor, decided to seize the opportunity of moving to the city to open a clinic. However, there was a huge gap between their ideals and reality. The clinic encountered difficulties. After Fu’s husband fell ill and passed away, Fu and her daughter struggled to survive in the unfamiliar city. Following Dreams of the River and Bing'ai, this is the third film of the Daughters of the River series set by the Yangtze River.

Feng Yan began making documentaries in 1994 using Super 8 and DV. Her first feature-length documentary, Dreams of the River (1997), was exhibited at the 1997 Yamagata International Documentary Film Festival in Japan, the 1998 Hong Kong International Film Festival, the Berlin Anthropology Film Festival, the 1st Yunnan Multiculture Visual Film Festival, and won the Excellence Award at the 1st Taiwan International Documentary Biennial in 1998.

In 2007, she completed Bing'ai, which was exhibited at the Vancouver International Film Festival, the Busan International Film Festival, the Vienna International Film Festival, and won the Excellence in Documentary Award at the 4th China Documentary Film Festival, the Ogawa Shinsuke Award in the New Asian Currents section at the Yamagata International Documentary Film Festival, the Association Award for Independent Films, the Best Film Award at the Observatori Festival in Spain, the Silver Balloon Award at the Three Continents Film Festival in Nantes, and the Grand Prize at the Filmer A Tour Prix Film Festival in Belgium. It also received the Humanitarian Award for Outstanding Documentary at the 32nd Hong Kong International Film Festival.

Film Database

To Live