movie · completed

Han ye Deng Zhu

寒夜灯柱

The future. Winter. Space travel is no longer a dream. A once-thriving film studio faces bankruptcy. The enormous compound, with structures ranging from the Great Sphinx of Giza to the Forbidden City, is now completely covered in snow and stripped of its former glory. Zha, a lonely janitor, tends to this forgotten place, with only a cat that used to perform in films for company. Running out of money, the studio owner gives him a VR headset as partial compensation. Zha is immediately drawn into the virtual world and embarks on a romantic journey with a female player who invites him on a trip to the moon. Meanwhile, the studio, which is about to close permanently, is temporarily brought back to life when a film crew arrives to shoot an alien invasion movie on the expansive backlot – with the studio’s actual destruction slated to be shot as the movie’s final showdown. (Source: Berlinale Film Festival)