Call of the willows

The film was nominated for the Golden Goblet Awards at the 24th Shanghai International Film Festival in June last year.

Its lead star, Zheng Yunlong, won a Golden Angel award for the best new actor at the 17th Chinese American Film Festival in Los Angeles in November.

Zheng, a musical theater actor and singer, said at the premiere in Beijing that the movie is his first major silver-screen project, and he regards it as a gift to pay tribute to his mother, a former Peking Opera actress.

The movie is adapted from the Mao Dun Literature Prize winning novelist Wang Xufeng's novella Liu Lang Wen Ying (Yellow Warblers Singing in a Sea of Willows)－also the film's Chinese title.

The tale is set in the titular park, one of the 10 most renowned scenic spots, surrounding the iconic West Lake in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province.