TV Series (China) for Magnolia Awards | To Depict the Real World and Record the Wonderful Life

Pass on true feelings day to day in the real world, and show strength in everyday life. In the past year, TV series with the theme of contemporary urban life have gained surviving popularity on the screen, and has repeatedly caused heated discussions in the society. They, from the perspective of the common people, offer a glimpse of social development, the changes of the times, and real life, presenting a vivid, real and three-dimensional urban panorama to the audience. Among the entries for the Magnolia Awards at this year's Shanghai TV Festival (STVF), there is another group of fine works——

OCTOGENARIAN AND THE 90S focuses on the issue of intergenerational care for the aged; TO THE OAK bluntly reveals the middle-aged crisis brought by the skating-by mentality; LOVE IN SHANGHAI tells the hardships of the Shanghai drifters; THE LAST GOODBYE TO MAMA is a warm family story book; MY TREASURE is a collection of the life wisdom of ordinary people; PERFECT MATCH revolves the gender issues in a subtle way; MODERN MARRIAGE looks into further the division of family labor; NEW GENERATION exquisitely composes the "Song of Youth" of grassroots Party members; A LITTLE MOOD FOR LOVE is a vivid picture of the life encounters spanning three generations; A LITTLE DILEMMA sparks social discussion about the dilemma between the tiger and free-range parenting; LIFE IS A LONG QUIET RIVER relieves the anxiety of buying a house with the attitude of “home is where the heart is”...

These works mirror real life and sketch the real world, unfolding before the audience the beauty, hope and dream therein.

OCTOGENARIAN AND THE 90S

The work is about the story between two post-90s youth and a group of eccentric yet lovely old people. Developed around the topic of elderly care, OCTOGENARIAN AND THE 90S constructs the story of intergeneration care for the aged with a consistent and vivid language through the comparison of two groups and the intersection of the three dimensions, namely family, love and friendship. Also, it deconstructs afresh the issue of caring for the aged from the perspective of young people and discusses love and responsibility in the collision of intergenerational concepts, to strike a chord among audiences of different ages.

TO THE OAK

TO THE OAK tells the story between a book publisher Ma Liewen and a teacher Jian Dan, who go through tides and tides in life with a positive attitude. The work brings into focus the middle-aged reorganization of families, bluntly uncovering the living conditions of the middle-aged and their common anxiety in real life, such as the bitterness of drifters in Beijing, the difficulty of harvesting love, the hardships of starting and maintaining a business, and the dilemma of intergenerational communication. With the fierce collision of various values, the work always conveys love and hope, relieving the audience’s confusion that comes with the middle age.

LOVE IN SHANGHAI

The drama runs on around the story of Li Wenjia, the child of an educated youth who returns to Shanghai, and Xu Dongyang, a young man from Northeast China who looks for a job in Shanghai, in chronological form. As the first domestically produced "8K full-process" TV series, LOVE IN SHANGHAI not only presents the changes of Shanghai's urban landscape with high-quality pictures, but also stages the struggle of a generation of Shanghai drifters, bringing back the audience’s memory of the past and worldly presence of the city.

THE LAST GOODBYE TO MAMA

The work revolves around the life story of a mother and son in a small town in northern Jiangsu to show the changes of an ordinary Chinese family in 30 years. Adopting a dual-line parallel narrative structure and switching between the lives of the two generations, it outlines the trajectories of the mother and the son for half a lifetime with delicate strokes. The mother is the reflection of the son, and the son is the shadow of the mother. The life paths of the two generations vary with different twists and turns, but finally lead to the same destination. The work is also a panorama of Chinese-style families dotted with the warm daily life of the mother and son.

MY TREASURE

MY TREASURE evolves along with the storyline of an ordinary mother and daughter who resolve the challenges in life with wisdom, support each other in hardships, and finally gain insights into the truth of life. In the work, the mother, Qiu Xiaoxia, has a mixed personality of a traditional Chinese mother who bears all burdens without complaints, and a woman with the meanness of market place. While inheriting the unyielding spirit, the daughter Qiu Dongna also wails from time to time, "I can live only if I get paid every day". The mother and daughter, as friends and fellow suffers, encourage each other, and convey the life belief of "born ordinary yet live brilliantly" through their struggling in a hard life.

PERFECT MATCH

The work zooms in on the marriage problems of the contemporary urban population and narrates the story of two couples who are once intimate, and stay true to their original aspiration and love in the face of a series of emotional crises such as unbalanced division of labor, workplace difficulties, and lack of trust. In the work, the four protagonists form together the silhouette of contemporary urban marriage to the audience in the whole process of marriage cracks, self-examination, to mutual understanding and common growth. The work closely follows the marital status of the urban population today, and depicts the various emotional dilemmas of gender relations refinedly.

MODERN MARRIAGE

MODERN MARRIAGE is filmed around the topic of "division of family labor". Full-time mother Shen Huixing raises her child to school age and returns to the workplace, but she has a disagreement with her husband, Sheng Jiangchuan. In the constant running-in, the two begin to re-examine the meaning of marriage. The work exposes unreservedly the interest and emotional conflicts in the marriage. And the protagonists, changing themselves in light of the family’s overall situation, finally achieve a balance between family and work. The values conveyed in the work thus have specific reference significance for the audience.

NEW GENERATION

Based on real character prototypes and events, the work reflects the look of the new era of socialism with Chinese characteristics in the form of unit drama. From community volunteers to EOD elites, from prosperous cities to beautiful villages, the work collectively shows the spirit of young grassroots Party members in the new era who dare to shoulder responsibilities and are ready to sacrifice and devote themselves, paying tribute to the centennial Communist Party of China with a vibrant song of youth.

A LITTLE MOOD FOR LOVE

A LITTLE MOOD FOR LOVE is about the story of two middle-aged people who have failed marriages and choose to protect each other and step into each other's lives facing the pressure from family and society. The work accurately portrays the different attitudes of the three generations of old, middle-aged and young people towards love and casts light upon the emotional relationship in real society. The social issues touched upon are profound yet not grandstanding, and the troubles faced in the work are as real and vivid as the stories that happen to the audience every day.

A LITTLE DILEMMA

As the third work of the "LITTLE" series, A LITTLE DILEMMA witnesses the changes in the parenting ways of two families whose children are about to continue studying in junior high school. The work, with the two families as control groups, shows two concepts of contemporary Chinese education - "tiger parenting" and " free-range parenting ", which has aroused extensive discussion at the public level. The work brings out keenly the "fear" and "love" of contemporary families, exposes the deep causes of "education anxiety", and provides a warm perspective for relieving this social pain point.

LIFE IS A LONG QUIET RIVER

The story begins with Feng Xiaoqin, a foreign daughter-in-law who hopes to buy a house in Shanghai, and records the great life changes experienced by the four generations of the Gu’s family. Through a series of events such as "buying a house" and "selling a house", it vividly shows the interweaving of fates among characters under different circumstances against the background of the economic development in Shanghai. With the life attitudes of characters who are in the quagmire of life and still fight with full spirit, the work warms and inspires those who are down-to-earth and serious about life.

The above urban-themed dramas have consciously scooped topics, ideas, and stories from the development of the times and the lives of the people to reveal social issues concerned by the people, such as housing, medical care, employment, education, and elderly care, thus adding dimensions to real life in this era on the screen and arousing resonance among the people.

Which works can stand out and shine on the stage for the Magnolia Awards of this year's STVF? Keep tuned to find the answer!