Story
In the winter of 1948, Beijing, a renowned writer (Jiang Wen) receives a letter from an unknown woman on his birthday. As he reads the letter, a female voiceover begins to recount a relationship he has forgotten. The woman, a Miss Jiang, tells of her first infatuation with the writer when she was in her early teens, when she was his neighbour at a siheyuan. When she moved back to Beijing years later as a student at the Peking Women's College, she had a brief liaison with him, after which she became pregnant. Days later, the writer had completely forgotten about her.
She gave birth to their son in Sichuan, during the war-torn years of the Second Sino-Japanese war. When she moved back to Beijing eight years later, after the war, she became a dance hostess to support her son. Although the two met again, the writer could not recognize her. They had one last liaison again. Though finding her familiar, the writer failed to pin down her identity. On the day after their son dies, she decides to write this letter to let him know of their existence.
Read more about this topic: Letter From An Unknown Woman (2004 Film)
Famous quotes containing the word story:
“The perfect detective story cannot be written. The type of mind which can evolve the perfect problem is not the type of mind that can produce the artistic job of writing.”
—Raymond Chandler (1888–1959)
“The public history of modern art is the story of conventional people not knowing what they are dealing with.”
—Robert Motherwell (1915–1991)
“Even such is Time, which takes in trust
Our youth, our joys, and all we have,
And pays us but with age and dust,
Who in the dark and silent grave
When we have wandered all our ways
Shuts up the story of our days.
And from which earth, and grave, and dust,
The Lord shall raise me up I trust.”
—Sir Walter Raleigh (1552–1618)