Zhang Junhan

The Founding of an Army is a 2017 Chinese film commissioned by China's government to commemorate the 90th anniversary of the founding of the People's Liberation Army.

Early 1980s. Liu Haizhu, a worker who admired his colleague Zhou Meng, helped the weak and loved to fight injustices. He provoked bad elements and brought danger to his family and friends. After being injured by bad guys and expelled from the factory, Liu Haizhu faced life-threatening challenges. But at this time, this magical man could actually stand up again, facing shocking challenges, shocking the world to complete his wonderful legend.

This tells the story of 1931, after the "Mukden Incident" broke out, the sniper Ren Tianxing did not listen to the dissuasion and led the anti-Japanese squad to be killed in a night battle to ambush the Japanese army. Ren Tianxing was also seriously injured and was rescued by bandits. Five years later, Ren Tianxing lives in a cottage, just drinking and gambling, and happened to meet Bai Ge, his former comrade-in-arms. In order to protect Bai Ge, he decided to join the CCP underground assassination organization, to participate in the assassination of Japanese virology expert Sakamoto Ichiro, and protect the people. It was his former opponent Sorimachi Kazuya who successfully killed Ichiro Sakamoto by acting alone to protect his comrade-in-arms Ren Tianxing. However, only three people, Ren Tianxing, Baige and Lao Jiao, survived the evacuation.

This film recounts the epic tale of Hua Mulan, who disguises herself as a man to enlist in the army in her father’s stead. When a battle injury forces her to seek medical aid, her true identity is exposed—unleashing a storm of chaos and moral reckoning that challenges societal norms and redefines heroism.

The movie begins with Gan Wei, a novelist who has been grappling with writer’s block for several years. Yet, a book written under her name – The Zodiac Mystery – appears in markets. Even more strangely, the people in the book bear the names of her childhood friends and experience situations that really happened to them. What’s worse is that the book writes of a mistake that the friends have kept secret for years. As her other friends turn on her and the events of the novel begin to invade reality, only Tong Dawei’s character stands by Gan Wei…