Selection is unveiling the primary trailer for “Shanghai Daughter,” the debut function from Chinese language filmmaker Agnis Shen Zhongmin that can world premiere within the Panorama part of the 2026 Berlin Worldwide Movie Competition.
The drama follows Ming, a Shanghai lady who travels alone to a rubber tree plantation in Xishuangbanna, alongside China’s southwestern border, looking for individuals who knew her late father through the Cultural Revolution’s Right down to the Countryside Motion half a century earlier. Because the previous manufacturing crew home faces demolition and mining firms and fashionable agricultural initiatives rework the land that after held rubber plantations, Ming encounters a farm officer, rural physician, Dai elder, rubber tapper, younger ecologist and a mysterious lady with a particular connection to her.
The movie attracts from Shen Zhongmin’s private experiences. “The seed of this movie was sown 14 years in the past, when my father had simply handed away from sickness,” the director explains in her assertion. “His demise and absence drove me to embark on a journey alone to the distant tropical land.”
Repeated visits over time fostered a deep bond with the area and its folks. “Rooted in my household historical past, this movie expands its thematic scope to an exploration of ecofeminism in addition to the pivotal chapters of China’s social historical past,” Shen Zhongmin says. “And for me, it’s also an experiment to discover a non-dual realm that blurs the traces between fiction and documentary, and between the non-public and the general public, by means of a easy and meditative cinematic language.”
The manufacturing options non-actors and real-life people alongside lead actress Liang Cuishan, who beforehand appeared in “Cloud in Her Room,” which received the Golden Tiger Award at Worldwide Movie Competition Rotterdam, and “Until Love Do Us Half,” which screened at Pingyao Worldwide Movie Competition.
“Past the non-actors/real-life people and the feminine lead, the landscapes, flora, and fauna of southwest China are additionally portrayed as silent characters in their very own proper,” Shen Zhongmin provides. “I hope this movie can immerse the viewers in a tangible geographical house, inviting them to stroll, observe, hear, and really feel alongside the characters.”
Shen Zhongmin can be a author and creator of brief story collections together with “Notes on Shanghai Geography,” “Deep Simulator” and “A Traveler’s Need.” She graduated from Tongji College with a level in movie directing and screenwriting, and beforehand labored as a journalist and newspaper editor earlier than transferring into cross-disciplinary apply in up to date artwork, literature and movie.
Producers are Xu Ruijing and Liao Yong for Twelve Oaks. Cinematographer is Pu Wei, with sound supervision by Dukar Tserang. The undertaking was beforehand chosen for the work-in-progress part of SIFF Mission on the 2025 Shanghai Worldwide Movie Competition.
Parallax Films is dealing with worldwide gross sales. The movie is shot in Mandarin Chinese language and Dai dialect.
Watch the trailer right here:
