No subtitle track in this language
Internet Archive · Daybreak (天明) - Silent, English subtitles · Public Domain Mark
No spoken dialogue. Intertitles: Chinese. No subtitle track in this language.
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Synopsis
Two young people leave the countryside hoping to build a life in Shanghai. Factory work and city streets expose them to exploitation rather than the opportunity they imagined. Their paths separate, but affection and political upheaval bring them together again under circumstances that demand more than a private act of loyalty.
Cast
DirectorsSun Yu
Historical context
Sun Yu uses the rural-to-urban journey to link personal misfortune with a wider social order. Li Lili’s physical expressiveness carries much of the argument in a film made during Shanghai’s transition from silent to sound production.
Sources and availability
The synopsis and editorial text were written for this collection. The references below were cross-checked to identify the film and its copy; each editorial section identifies its reference.
Work catalogued as public domain in the United States.
The public-domain references concern the original films in the United States. Rights can differ for other countries, editions, restorations, music or translations. Sources are listed on each film page.
Availability checked on September 11, 2026.
Photograph credit
Photographs cropped, resized and optimized as WebP, displayed in monochrome.
- Li Lili — Unknown photographer, 1930s; source Sina, via Wikimedia Commons. Commons source was already denoised and sharpened. · Public domain — PD-China and PD-1996
