Directed by Vivien Qu, Starring Vicky Chen, Zhou Meijun, Le Geng, Mengan Li and Weiwei Liu

Somewhere by the seaside, a young girl works (and lives) at a motel where she sees things she shouldn’t. While the desk clerk is detained, she checks in a man who arrives at the motel with two young teenage girls and she later sees him go into their room. When detectives come to the hotel to make inquires, she is encouraged to keep quiet by her own desire not to be displaced.

Vivien Qu provides no backstory to the characters and that we come up with our own is part of the beauty of this film. This is a story of the fear, shame and the pressures that come in the way of telling the truth about sexual abuse. Qu’s timing is perfect. The film was shown at TIFF before the onslaught of abuse claims that have berated the film industry and politics, and we are under no illusion that abuse exists everywhere.

To describe the film in detail would take away the experience, for Qu’s film is gorgeous despite the despicable nature of the story. It is a heartbreaking film with a glimmer of hope that everyone should see.