Extraordinary Drama
This amazing Chinese drama---one of the best of 2025---stars Hu Jun in the role of a platoon leader in the Northeast Anti-Japanese United Army during the 14-year Second Sino-Japanese War.
After his team is scattered, Hu Jun, as Lu Chang Shan, searches for each of them–-bringing them back together, one by one to continue their mission to defeat the Japanese and reclaim their land.
I’m usually not a fan of war movies, but this drama is exceptional. It’s never boring, and never repetitive---showing how individual human beings dealt with the challenges of food shortages, prison camps, cruelty, deprivation, and loss.
While there’s plenty of suffering, this drama is not a downer. It’s human, entertaining, and sprinkled throughout with good-natured banter. In fact, it’s mostly uplifting, depicting the best of human nature, as well as the worst. The camera work, the OST, and especially the acting is immensely moving and poignant.
Americans, as a whole, unfortunately, have almost no knowledge of the degree to which China suffered, but ultimately prevailed, in World War II. Even this drama barely scratches the surface. (For a more granular and depressing account of the unmitigated horrors of this conflict read The Rape Of Nanking: The Forgotten Holocaust Of World War II by Iris Chang.)
I can’t say enough good things about Hu Jun, who plays the heroic, but extremely kind and compassionate, Lu Chang Shan, a man who nurtures each member of his team as needed, and is also wiley and shrewd when necessary. Other actors who deserve respect for their portrayals are too numerous to mention–really, almost all of them.
I don’t often give praise like this. But this series is a triumph of Chinese cinema. Don’t miss it.
After his team is scattered, Hu Jun, as Lu Chang Shan, searches for each of them–-bringing them back together, one by one to continue their mission to defeat the Japanese and reclaim their land.
I’m usually not a fan of war movies, but this drama is exceptional. It’s never boring, and never repetitive---showing how individual human beings dealt with the challenges of food shortages, prison camps, cruelty, deprivation, and loss.
While there’s plenty of suffering, this drama is not a downer. It’s human, entertaining, and sprinkled throughout with good-natured banter. In fact, it’s mostly uplifting, depicting the best of human nature, as well as the worst. The camera work, the OST, and especially the acting is immensely moving and poignant.
Americans, as a whole, unfortunately, have almost no knowledge of the degree to which China suffered, but ultimately prevailed, in World War II. Even this drama barely scratches the surface. (For a more granular and depressing account of the unmitigated horrors of this conflict read The Rape Of Nanking: The Forgotten Holocaust Of World War II by Iris Chang.)
I can’t say enough good things about Hu Jun, who plays the heroic, but extremely kind and compassionate, Lu Chang Shan, a man who nurtures each member of his team as needed, and is also wiley and shrewd when necessary. Other actors who deserve respect for their portrayals are too numerous to mention–really, almost all of them.
I don’t often give praise like this. But this series is a triumph of Chinese cinema. Don’t miss it.
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