“If we don’t help him out, he might have end up on the street”
“But if we do, it could change his life”
“I’m a bad mother”
“That’s my biggest regret”
“It’s been 18 years”
“Only if my son could come back”
“Second Life” is an 8-episode documentary film
Each episode focus on a major twist in life
There is divorce when a marriage is falling apart
How should life go on
There is young people who choose plastic surgery because of appearance anxiety
Do they see a turnaround
There is getting out of jail, how one atone for sins
There is parents searching for lost child
And after the child is found
How the child gets along with parents on both sides
Documentary film | “Second Life”
People sometimes want a reboot
Qin Bo Film Director
Or bid farewell to the old self
But when we look back
We’d realize it’s impossible
We always have the old self in us
“Don’t fall behind”
“Show time now”
He Huajie Vlogger
“First of all”
“Playing the leg-cello”
He Huajjie, the protagonist in “Boy on Wheel”
A twenty-something handsome young man, 5’11
Paralyzed by car accident
From trying to survive
To learn to support his body with his fists
“Touching the ground”
Getting on a wheelchair, picking up stuff, putting on pants
Learning to drive, and driving to Tibet with wheel buddies
He Huajie’s mother
“Here’s lunch”
“Is that enough”
Because he had his mom as a safety net
He never accomplished the transformation from ground to wheelchair
So in Tibet
His wheel buddies challenged him
“He won’t always have his mother to go to”
“We have to push him”
“But he is gonna cry”
“He must get up on his own”
“Let’s push him”
He went through a long and painstaking process
Not everyone suffers from such extreme tests
Most people’s life is ordinary
Such as Huang Meifang, a girl working in Shenzhen
“Have you Shenzhen citizenship”
Huang Meifang A member of the city
“No, I don’t have enough points”
She comes to Shenzhen from her hometown in Guangxi, working in an electronics factory
Her husband is a Huolala driver, he doesn’t make much money
The family lives in a tiny rented apartment, the only bedroom belongs to the child
She has no time to complain
She has a clear determination in mind
Which is to become a real member of the city through her own effort
“Gender role is a set of behavior mode”
“Which matches the nature of human”
“The girl of Alishan is as beautiful as water”
Only if their son could study here and eventually be accepted to a college
And won’t have to do physical work like his parents
In comparison to the female worker
Is the urban woman we see in the divorce law firm
Zhou Dongxiao Stay-at-home mom
She is a stay-at-home mom in her 40s
She has two children, one in junior high school, one in primary school
She’s like, your effort will be seen in the workplace
Whereas at home, however hard you work, nobody appreciates it
“When it comes to work”
“The effort you make is in proportion to your rewards”
“It’s different from relationships”
Though she is divorced, her ex-husband doesn’t have time to take care of their children
She tutors their younger child everyday
“Shall we finish the English homework first”
“We have to leave at 5:30”
“All right”
Even the lawyer finds the conditions of this mediation very harsh
But she agrees to it
She has to be true to herself, meanwhile she won’t let go of her children
“Three, four hundred meters to go, get ready”
“Speed up”
In addition to fighting one’s own fate
There is also a story about a teacher changing the fate of a group of children
His name is Baijian, who started sponsoring children from 26 years ago
“We can only fit one face in here”
“You are blocking the camera, back off a little”
Up to now his “Home of Dream” has sponsored over one hundred children
“Mom is the worst in the world”
“I feel so much better without my mom”
Their families
Either divorced
Their parents suffer from mental diseases
“I love my imagination”
“I hate my destiny”
He teaches them to run
In the hope that they might be enrolled into college with specialty in sports
Find them a way out
“Three seconds faster”
“Try five seconds faster each kilometer”
“Sweat more now”
“And you will be thankful when you get into college”
“Thinking about that and you will be able to run faster”
“April”
The most precious thing is that
Baijian has been trying to make up for their pain with love
“They don’t care for the children”
“Five in the evening”
“It’s freezing”
Many are blaming their parents
They want the children to remember how their parents do them wrong
How bad their parenting is
But Baijian doesn’t
He tells people that the strongest weapon against hatred is love
“Fill your heart with anything but hate”
“Love and gratefulness is a better choice”
“Then you will be happy”
In the children’s life
He is like lighting up a match
Then run in the long dark night and fulfill their life
The whole film
Presents the complexity of human nature
As well as the love and fear of Chinese people
Love is the affection and warmth between family members
Fear is the terror one experiences when bad things happen
When faced with the uncertainty of fate, how do we fight it
The answer could be helping out each other
In addition to confrontation, we may also try to reconcile
This if also our unique way of fighting destiny
I like a poem of Tagore
Faith is the bird that feels the light and sings when the dawn is still dark
In the darkest time
We need hope even more
Hope is like the upcoming dawn
When people have a purpose
He will have faith
Then he could go on with the faith