Love for Life

Set in a modern-day rural region, the story unfolds during the AIDS era’s ongoing awareness, where illness reshapes daily life. The harsh winter intensifies hardship as the fever traverses the village, testing loyalties and resolve. The community’s acts of care occur against a backdrop of suspicion, gossip, and fragile hope.

The Goddess Temple village sits high in the mountains, a peaceful rural community that becomes ground zero for fear as a deadly fever spreads. The abandoned village school is repurposed as a shelter for the infected, symbolizing fragile solidarity amid suspicion. The stark landscape and social tension frame a tragedy where caretaking becomes a quiet, defiant act.

❤️ Love

A forbidden romance grows between Zhao Deyi and Shang Qinqin, born from shared exile and vulnerability. Their bond offers tenderness and resilience in a community quick to condemn, with the red jacket symbolizing life, risk, and desire in equal measure.

🕊️ Guilt

Guilt threads through Lao Zhuzhu's decision to shelter the sick and Zhao Deyi's role in the outbreak, forcing the family and village to reckon with responsibility and forgiveness. The drama probes how a community weighs personal guilt against collective care.

🏥 Care

Caretaking becomes a political act as the infected are brought into the school-turned-shelter, challenging social norms and isolation. The film follows small, intimate gestures—sharing space, warmth, and resources—as a fragile attempt to reconstruct family and belonging.

❄️ Illness

The fever's merciless force drives fear, death, and acts of devotion—Qinqin's icy bath to ease Deyi's suffering and the community's shrinking world under winter's cold. The illness exposes the fragility of life and the price of love in crisis.