A teenage girl during Japanese occupation of Northeast China joins a group of bandits to get revenge after her friend is brutally gang-raped by the invaders.
The story is based on the popular novel developed from folk legend. It goes that the Manchurian emperor Qianlong of China (circa 18th Century) was actually the son of a Han Chinese, the subject ethnicity. His brother of blood, Chen Jialuo just happened to be the chief of the Red Flower Society, an anti-Manchu secret society. Chen, a learned scholar, thought he could get his brother turn his back on the Manchu and restore the Han Chinese reign. But the story was ended by brutal clearence of the society members. It reflects one of the dark pages in Chinese culture, that ethics and humanity always become impotent when countered with power.
When the villagers in Qingshuilian village along the Xiaoli River in northern Shaanxi have to evacuate to intruding forces of Hu Zongnan, only a stubborn grandfather is left behind.
Based on Zhou Keqin's excellent novel, Xu Mao and His Daughters weaves a story about the life and sufferings of Xu Mao, an aging peasant and his four daughters in the countryside during the Cultural Revolution. They struggle to make ends meet since his wife's death. Preoccupied with worries, he loses touch with his maturing daughters. It takes the stubborn but kindly intervention of a woman making a governmental inspection tour to cause father and daughters to appreciate their loving family.
After being swindled out of his land by a local landlord in 1930s China, a grandfather commits suicide. His son burns down the landlord's house in a fit of rage, then escapes to join the PLA. His grandson later joins the PLA too in the 1940s to avenge his father, grandfather and mother.
