Xiao-Yun is a 16-year-old high school student in a small riverside town in China?s South-Western Sichuan province in the repressive social climate of 1983. When her teacher discovers that she is pregnant, she and her boyfriend Wang Feng are expelled from school. Wang Feng leaves her after convincing his sister Wang Zheng-Yue, a nurse, to help Xiao-Yun give birth to her baby, then give it up for adoption. Ten years later, Xiao-Yun is reduced to being the lead singer in a humiliatingly crass local song and dance troupe. She manages to sustain a furtive relationship with a married man, but her only real companion is Xiao-Yong, a preternaturally curious and impish young boy from across the dam. He craftily begins to insinuate himself into her life, becoming her devoted friend, servant, ?little brother?, and even, in an innocent and playful way, a kind of preadolescent substitute ?boyfriend?. But Xiao-Yun still has to forge a future from her unresolved past. Even soul-mate Xiao-Yong is unable to help her take the fateful, agonising decision that will make this possible.

?I always maintain that this is a film full of hope. I say this because it tells a story about searching for a way out. Metaphorically speaking, Xiao-Yun is like a thirsty person suddenly finding a cup of water. I use a method quite close to traditional narrative to relate a contemporary story about a woman subject to the overwhelming pressure of an unchanging tradition.?

LI Yu was born in China's Shangdong province in 1973. At the age of 16, on her mother's urging, she started to work as television programme guest presenter. After graduating from university, she satisfied her mother's expectations and became a professional presenter at a local television station.. After some time working on documentaries as an off-screen narrator, she began making documentaries. Consequently, she joined the CCTV (China Central Television) feature programme ?Life Space? and became a documentary director. Apart from working as a documentary director, she has written a number of novels and screenplays. In 2000, she shot her first feature film, Fish and Elephant.