Isabella Zang

After a massive earthquake razed a Chinese city to the ground, thousands of parents who lost their children are encouraged to give a new birth so that they can move on with their lives. AFTER THE RAIN follows two of these families for over a decade. Haunted by fear, resentment, and unspeakable grief, the families find hope beyond their intergenerational trauma is hard to build.

In May 2010, Ye Hongmei, a native of Dujiangyan city in Sichuan province, started her Odyssey to get pregnant again. Her eight year old daughter was killed in the devastating Wenchuan earthquake of 2008, a catastrophe that killed and maimed more than 6000 children. Due to China's one-child policy, most of the grieving families were left childless.

Chinese poet Xiuhua Yu, who has cerebral palsy, became instantly famous when her poems went viral on social media. When it happened she was stuck in a violent and loveless marriage in rural China. Director Jian Fan’s award-winning 2016 documentary Still Tomorrow followed her throughout her breakthrough year, when she gained the financial freedom to end her marriage. All that was missing was love.