MA WU JIA

Ma Wu Jia lives with his ailing mother and his younger brother Wu Ding in a small town in Guangxi, and actually couldn't do more for the brother, who suffers from a kidney disease. Ma Wu Jia gives up school and takes a factory job to become the family breadwinner; he gives up running in order to provide blood for his brother's transfusions; and when his brother loses fingers while playing on the railway track, Wu Jia agrees to sacrifice two of his own as transplants for Wu Ding. So his life is one of unending sacrifices ... and yet still some would call him a bad kid, especially when he takes the biggest decision of his life in the closing scenes.
Writer-director Zhao Ye, who is making his feature debut, clearly empathises with this boxed-in boy, and makes it easy for us to do so, too. Ma Wu Jia's life becomes a metaphor for entrapment and the impulse to break free, and his moral choices stand for those we all have to make. Persuasively acted by the non-pro, Zhao's film is an engrossing and morally challenging experience.