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OPEN CLASSIC CINEMA · 628

Light of Motherhood

193392 minChina

Synopsis

To make a living, Huiying remarries and brings her daughter with her. The daughter, Xiaomei, becomes a singer under a musician's guidance. When Huiying's former husband returns from Southeast Asia, the family's hidden past resurfaces. Xiaomei's suffering after marriage forces her mother to travel to her aid, and both women begin to reconsider the ties between marriage, money and family affection.

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Video edition: YouTube
Original language: No spoken dialogue. Intertitles: Chinese.
This copy runs: 92:05
Subtitles: No subtitle track in this language

No spoken dialogue. Intertitles: Chinese. No subtitle track in this language.

Languages and subtitles

No subtitle track in this language

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Cast

Li Zhuozhuo

Jin Yan

Chen Yanyan

DirectorsBu Wancang

Historical context

The film connects a Shanghai family with the lives of Chinese workers in Southeast Asia. Through the marriages of two generations, it questions the class dependence behind a comfortable life. Songs express suffering within the story, while the selected copy retains the narrative form of silent-film intertitles.

Sources and availability

General references identify the work and its copy. A reference beside an editorial section is linked to the claims checked in that section.

Virtual Shanghai · CNRS Wikipedia Wikimedia Commons · copyright reference China · Copyright Law, Article 23 US Copyright Office · foreign works Internet Archive · film copy Wikimedia Commons · film copy

Work catalogued as public domain in the United States.

The reference concerns the original work. Restorations, colorization, translations and other territories may have different conditions. This site uses the player enabled by the channel.

Availability checked on September 11, 2026.

Photograph credit

Photographs cropped, resized and optimized as WebP, displayed in monochrome.

Li Zhuozhuo — Liangyou (The Young Companion), issue 92, 1934; original color-tinted cover photograph of Lai Cheuk-cheuk (Li Zhuozhuo), via Wikimedia Commons. · Public domain — PD-China and PD-1996
Jin Yan — Unknown photographer, 1930s; Wikimedia Commons. · Public domain — PD-China and PD-1996
Chen Yanyan — Liangyou (The Young Companion), issue 96, October 1934; Chen Yanyan is the standing actress, as identified by the English Wikipedia caption; via Wikimedia Commons. · Public domain — PD-China and PD-1996

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