To Live to Sing(2019)
Zhao Li manages a Sichuan Opera troupe that lives and performs together in a rundown theatre in the outskirts of Chengdu. When she receives an order of demolition, she hides the news, fearing that this could spell their end. Secretly, she wouldn’t mind stopping since their life has become harder over the years. But what else can she do? She also worries that her niece Dan Dan, their star, will leave them for a better future in the city. To keep her troupe “family” together, Zhao Li begins a search for a new theatre for them to both sing and live in. As she struggles with bureaucracy, the characters from the opera world that she uses to escape her troubles begin to seep into her real life…
Movie: To Live to Sing
Top 10 Billed Cast
Liu Min
Video Trailer To Live to Sing
Video: Official Trailer
Official Trailer
TO LIVE TO SING clip | BFI London Film Festival 2019
Recommendations Movies
Buddha Mountain(zh)
In Chengdu, China, a retired female opera singer named Master Chang takes in a trio of young tenants into her boarding home. The tenants include a rock singer and a college student who has run away from home.
Vanya on 42nd Street(en)
An uninterrupted rehearsal of Chekhov's 'Uncle Vanya' plays out by a company of actors. The setting: their run-down theater with an unusable stage and crumbling ceiling. The play is shown act by act with the briefest of breaks to move props or for refreshments. The lack of costumes, real props and scenery is soon forgotten.
Hardball(en)
An aimless young man who is scalping tickets, gambling and drinking, agrees to coach a Little League team from the Cabrini Green housing project in Chicago as a condition of getting a loan from a friend.
Upstream(zh)
A moment of impulsiveness turns Gao Zhilei into a "stay-at-home" individual, but he never expected his life to take a turn in the opposite direction. A series of changes compel him to take on his responsibilities as the head of the family. When life's burdens hit hard, he must confront himself and start anew.
Pickpocket(zh)
A small town pickpocket whose friends have moved on to higher trades finds himself bitter and unable to adapt.
One Second(zh)
A movie fan escapes from a labour camp during the Chinese Cultural Revolution and strikes up a relationship with a homeless female vagabond.
The Young One(en)
A jazz musician seeks refuge from a lynch mob on a remote island, where he meets a hostile game warden and the young object of his attentions.
The Boys from Fengkuei(zh)
Ah-Ching and his friends have just finished school in their island fishing village, and now spend most of their time drinking and fighting. Three of them decide to go to the port city of Kaohsiung to look for work. They find an apartment through relatives, and Ah-Ching is attracted to the girlfriend of a neighbor. There they face the harsh realities of the big city.
The Kindness of Strangers(en)
Clara and her two sons escape from her abusive husband with little more than their car and plan to start over in New York. After the car towed away, the family meets Alice, who gets them into an emergency shelter. While stealing food at a Russian restaurant called ‘Winter Palace’, Clara meets Marc, who has been given the chance to help the old eatery regain its former glory. The ‘Winter Palace’ soon becomes a place of unexpected encounters between people who are all undergoing some sort of crisis and whom fate has now brought together.
Lighting Up the Stars(zh)
Having been released after serving his sentence, a funeral director accidentally crosses paths with a girl which brings about an unexpected change in his attitude towards life.
El Chicano(en)
A pair of twin brothers from East L.A. choose to live their lives differently and end up on opposite sides of the law.
Dwelling in the Fuchun Mountains(zh)
In the Chinese town of Fuyang, four brothers go about their day-to-day lives, their destinies shaped by love and challenges.
All Day and a Night(en)
While serving life in prison, a young man looks back at the people, the circumstances and the system that set him on the path toward his crime.
What Maisie Knew(en)
In New York City, a young girl is caught in the middle of her parents' bitter custody battle.
So Long, My Son(zh)
Two married couples adjust to the vast social and economic changes taking place in China from the 1980s to the present.
Norman(en)
A teenager pretends to be dying from cancer as a way to cope with the realities of his daily existence and his father's terminal illness.
Babylon(en)
Drama telling the story of Blue, a young man of Jamaican descent living in Brixton in 1980, as he hangs out with his friends, fronts a dub sound system, loses his job, struggles with family problems and has his friendships tested by racism.
Mindwalk(en)
On the French island of Mont Saint-Michel, Jack, a failed presidential candidate, Tom, a poet and Sonia, a physicist, engage in an intellectual conversation about politics, philosophy and life over the course of a single day.
Imperial Dreams(en)
A 21-year-old reformed gangster's devotion to his family and his future is put to the test when he is released from prison and returns to his old stomping grounds in Watts, Los Angeles.