Tuya's Marriage

Inner Mongolia, China. Tuya herds sheep on the steppe and looks after two children. Her husband Bater was injured digging a well and cannot walk. All the work falls on her, and in the end her own back gives out. The doctor puts it plainly: keep going like this and you will be lying down too. Tuya makes a decision: she will divorce Bater and marry again, on one condition, that the new husband takes care of Bater as well. Suitors come. One has money, one is an old acquaintance, and not one of them can really accept the condition. Wang Quan'an directs the Chinese film; ninety-six minutes, with Yu Nan as Tuya and most of the rest of the cast not professional actors but people who live in the region. It won the Golden Bear at the Berlin Film Festival in 2007. The grazing land on the steppe is shrinking and the nomadic life is ending; that is what sits behind the film.