Xie Yan

In 1960s China, French diplomat Rene Gallimard falls in love with opera singer Song Liling – but Song is not at all who Gallimard thinks.

At the end of the 19th century, Shanghai is divided into several foreign concessions. In the British concession, a number of luxurious “flower houses” are reserved for the male elite of the city. Since Chinese dignitaries are not allowed to frequent brothels, these establishments are the only ones that these men can visit. They form a self-contained world, with its own rites, traditions and even its own language. The men don’t only visit the houses to frequent the courtesans but also to dine, smoke opium, play mahjong and relax. The women working there are known as the “flowers of Shanghai”.

In 1936 China, a nearly bankrupt drama troupe starts performing in a burned-out theater where the great actor Song Danping was killed. One of the actors, Wei Qing, starts seeing strange apparitions that could revive his troupe and deliver him to the same fate as Song Danping.

To celebrate his newborn baby girl, an old wine brewer made a bottle of Maiden Rose for her future marriage. Eighteen years later, the girl was already a beautiful woman and fall in love with a youngster. However, her father was unhappy with their romance, though she had been pregnant. Fifty years passed by, three women of three generations finally had a chance to drink that bottle of Maiden Rose.

Carol 'Do Do' Cheng portrays the tough, eventful life of "Mama Boss" from childhood in pre-1949 Guilin to disillusionment in 1970s Taipei, where she struggles to run a noodle shop and contend with a host of colourful customers.

A couple working in a chemical factory inexplicably die after the birth of their son. Then, the baby appears to cause the death of the pets of his adoptive family. When he is isolated for study, he is shown to be aging and growing rapidly, and to have highly toxic saliva.