Summary
At the heart of 'An Untold Tale of the Borderlands' lies the tragic entanglement of Wang Guisheng, an orphaned farmhand, and his female cousin, Li Ah Zhen, whose childhood bond blossoms into an anticipated marital union within their rural early 20th-century Chinese village. Their modest hopes are shattered following Ah Zhen’s mother’s death from illness and relentless toil. Her grieving father’s hasty remarriage introduces an insidious stepmother who connives to marry Ah Zhen off to her own nephew, severing the young lovers' connection. Despondent and adrift, Guisheng is persuaded by a government emissary to join a resettlement initiative on the remote borderlands, leaving Ah Zhen to face a bleak future alone. The narrative escalates to a chilling climax on Ah Zhen's wedding night, as she, already suffering from illness, is accosted by her unwanted groom. The following morning, the sinister tableau of a stabbed corpse in the bridal chamber and a body, still in a bridal gown, discovered at the bottom of a well, leaves the audience grappling with the horrifying, unresolved question of what transpired in the darkness.
Synopsis
This partially-extant silent film focuses on the lives of people in rural China during the early twentieth century. Wang Guisheng (played by Wang Yuanlong) is an orphan who grew up at his uncle's, working as a farmhand. Since childhood, he has been close with his female cousin, Li Ah Zhen (played by Li Minghui), and they expect to marry. But when her mother dies of illness and overwork, Ah Zhen's father re-marries, and the evil stepmother connives to marry Ah Zhen off to the stepmother's nephew. Then a government representative comes to the village recruiting peasants to establish a new settlement on the borderlands, she persuades the despondent Guisheng to sign up. Guisheng leaves his love behind, only to find hardship on the frontier. Ah Zhen, who has fallen ill, is set upon by her groom on her wedding night...BUT the next morning his stabbed corpse is found in the bridal chamber and a body in a bridal gown is found down a well. WHAT HAS HAPPENED?!?!?!?!.
