In my opinion, this movie is the best for teaching Chinese history and showing people's life from 1940's to 1970's in China. The movie uses one family's story to reflect the entire Chinese society during this historical period. It covers the history of the anti-japanese war(1938-1945), the civil war(1945-1949), the land reform, the great leap forward, and the cultural revolution.
The main character--Fugui used to be a rich and spoiled son who gambles and loses the last mansion the family had, saved his life because of losing his mansion. He and his family went through drastic life changes along with the entire China. His two children both ended losing their lives due to the hard social and politicl situation at the time.
Certain scenes in this movie might be considered too graphic such as the death of the son and the daughter which showed quite a lot blood. Check it out, I think this movie overall had very high educational value for many subject areas.
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