During the typhoon season in southern China, a middle-aged film director Yang Pingdao suspects his wife is having an affair. He attempts to follow his wife in secret with the help of a young intern girl to collect the evidence. Ironically, it is he who begins to have feelings for the intern girl. As the journey continues, the intern girl is still not sure what is happening. Perhaps the whole plot is an act for "A Yang Pingdao Film," and maybe without her knowledge, she has actually been one of the characters from the start.

1930's China. The village of a poor family is taken over by the occupying Japanese army. One son, Zhongliang, leaves his wife and young son to join a medic group for the Chinese Army. The other son, Zhangmin goes into hiding to protect his family. The focus shifts back and forth from the brothers' parents and Zhongliang's wife and son to Zhongliang's newfound life of luxury in a town not too far away. The plight of Zhongliang's mother, his wife, Sufan and her son, Kongeson is contrasted with Zhongliang's rise in a flourishing company.

During the shut down and destruction of the Japanese test camp Squadron 731 in Manchuria, a soldier becomes infected with a virus developed during the camp's testing and risks spreading it into Japan on the train ride home.