Set against the backdrop of massive economic growth in the 1990s, the story follows A Bao, a self-made millionaire and his journey from being a young opportunist with a troubled past to accumulating dazzling wealth in the city of Shanghai. It also follows his entanglement with four women who represent the pursuits of his life: adventure, honour, love and innocence.
Set in a bustling alleyway during the Japanese occupation of Shanghai in the 1940s, the film centres on a wife, Zhan Zhou, who was being charged with the bloody dismemberment of her husband – a killing that seems impossible for her to have committed alone. The murder thrusts Zhan into the spotlight and the court of public opinion, forcing her towards a fate intertwined with that of her own country.
