# After Separation
**After Separation** (大撒把) is a 1992 Chinese romance comedy directed by Xia Gang, starring Ge You and Xu Fan as two spouses left behind in Beijing when their partners emigrate in the early 1990s wave of study abroad.
| Key fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Original title | 大撒把 (Da Sa Ba); also known in Hong Kong as 北京痴男怨女[1](https://movie.douban.com/subject/1309235//) |
| Director / writers | Xia Gang; screenplay by Feng Xiaogang and Zheng Xiaolong[1](https://movie.douban.com/subject/1309235//) |
| Stars | Ge You as Gu Yan, Xu Fan as Lin Zhouyun[1](https://movie.douban.com/subject/1309235//) |
| Production / release | Beijing Film Studio; released in mainland China in October 1992[2](https://www.1905.com/mdb/film/61000/) |
| Golden Rooster Awards 1993 | Ge You won Best Actor and Xia Gang Best Director; the film was nominated for Best Story Film and Best Screenplay, and Xu Fan for Best Actress[3](https://baike.sogou.com/m/fullLemma?lid=76632105) |
| International release | Japan on December 7, 1993 as 再見のあとで, distributed by Toko Tokuma; 94 minutes, color, 35mm[4](https://www.allcinema.net/cinema/14834) |
| Festival | International premiere at the International Film Festival Rotterdam 1994[5](https://iffr.com/en/iffr/1994/films/after-separation) |
| Douban rating | 8.1/10 from 37,631 users[1](https://movie.douban.com/subject/1309235//) |
## Spoilers
### Plot
At a crowded Beijing airport, the photographer Gu Yan (顾颜) sees off his wife, who is leaving for self-funded study in Canada. There he meets Lin Zhouyun (林周云), whose husband is also flying out for a long stay abroad; her husband entrusts the pregnant Lin to the stranger and hurries to his plane, and although Gu Yan takes her to hospital she miscarries.[5](https://iffr.com/en/iffr/1994/films/after-separation) • [6](https://neodb.social/movie/04JgVUcnzVqfC2hzNJodLB)
A year later the two left-behind spouses meet again by chance. Gu Yan, alone, pours out his longing for his wife, while Lin Zhouyun is excited because she is about to join her husband in the United States.[6](https://neodb.social/movie/04JgVUcnzVqfC2hzNJodLB) Another year passes and Lin's visa still has not come through. The two lonely people agree to spend the Spring Festival together, and over five days of holiday a long-buried affection quietly grows between them.[6](https://neodb.social/movie/04JgVUcnzVqfC2hzNJodLB) When Lin finally obtains a visa to visit her husband, she faces a difficult choice, and the parting comes on her day of departure.[5](https://iffr.com/en/iffr/1994/films/after-separation) • [6](https://neodb.social/movie/04JgVUcnzVqfC2hzNJodLB) In the Japanese synopsis, Gu Yan photographs Lin at Beijing's famous sites before her departure, the two share a [New Year's Eve](https://www.edgepedia.org/new-years-eve) as if married, and Gu Yan's own wife sends a divorce agent to his farewell party for Lin.[7](https://eiga.com/movie/67885/)
## Title and meaning
The title 大撒把 is Beijing slang for a cyclist letting go of the handlebars and riding on; it carries the sense of letting things drift, and the film uses it for ordinary people facing life's difficulties in Beijing culture.[2](https://www.1905.com/mdb/film/61000/) Director Xia Gang said he wanted to film the emotions of [Chinese people](https://www.edgepedia.org/chinese-people) who, in the tide of going abroad, could not "let go".[8](https://www.1905.com/mdb/film/61000/feature/)
## Background and production
The film grew out of the first "going abroad" boom of the early 1990s, when many people in China's big cities were trying to leave the country to study. Xia Gang recalled that after talking with around 20 young writers, including [Wang Shuo](https://www.edgepedia.org/wang-shuo), Feng Xiaogang and Zheng Xiaolong, he persuaded Beijing Film Studio to finance the movie, which recruited Feng and Zheng as scriptwriters.[9](https://www.chinaservicesinfo.com/s/202201/10/WS61db8ae8498e6a12c121cb81/summit-reviews-the-early-golden-age-of-chinese-cinema.html) The story drew on screenwriter Zheng Xiaolong's own experience: his wife had insisted on going abroad against his objections, making him one of the "left-behind men".[10](https://news.sina.cn/sa/2005-10-11/detail-ikkntiam4802629.d.html?wm=3049_0015)
The screenplay took a year and five drafts, with the title changed from 《陌生的脸有甜蜜的危险》 to 《大撒把》. The studio hesitated to greenlight a modern story without fight scenes or titillation, and after a rival Shanghai film, *The Left-behind Lady*, appeared, Beijing Film Studio nearly abandoned the project; Xia Gang credits his wife Mengzhu's daily lobbying at the studio with saving it.[8](https://www.1905.com/mdb/film/61000/feature/) • [10](https://news.sina.cn/sa/2005-10-11/detail-ikkntiam4802629.d.html?wm=3049_0015) Because a key sequence was set on [Lunar New Year](https://www.edgepedia.org/lunar-new-year)'s Eve, Xia Gang arranged the shoot so that the film's New Year's Eve was the real one of 1992: the crew filmed from the top of the Beijing Guest House, recording the fireworks at midnight.[8](https://www.1905.com/mdb/film/61000/feature/) • [10](https://news.sina.cn/sa/2005-10-11/detail-ikkntiam4802629.d.html?wm=3049_0015)
## Cast and reception
Ge You had never played a leading man before; Feng Gong had wanted the role and offered to bring 1.5 million yuan of investment, but Xia Gang chose Ge You, telling him the comedy should come from the story rather than his own mugging. Ge You won the Golden Rooster Award for Best Actor for the role.[10](https://news.sina.cn/sa/2005-10-11/detail-ikkntiam4802629.d.html?wm=3049_0015) Xu Fan was also playing her first female lead, introduced through the family of Xia's wife; at the 13th Golden Rooster Awards she was nominated for Best Actress while Ge You, Xia Gang, and the screenwriters Zheng Xiaolong and Feng Xiaogang took or were nominated for their awards.[3](https://baike.sogou.com/m/fullLemma?lid=76632105) • [10](https://news.sina.cn/sa/2005-10-11/detail-ikkntiam4802629.d.html?wm=3049_0015) The film also won the Excellent Feature Film award at the first Shandong Film Festival and was named among the top ten films of 1992 by the third Shanghai Film Critics' awards.[3](https://baike.sogou.com/m/fullLemma?lid=76632105)
Later commentary has placed the film in the Beijing-flavor (京味) tradition: in 2021 it was screened in a seven-day retrospective of classic Beijing films alongside *Black Snow* and *The Story of Qiu Ju*, and critics read it as a humorous, self-deprecating embrace of the people left behind by the emigration wave.[11](https://www.xinhuanet.com/local/2021-02/04/c_1127065443.htm) • [10](https://news.sina.cn/sa/2005-10-11/detail-ikkntiam4802629.d.html?wm=3049_0015)
## Place in Feng Xiaogang's career
For Feng Xiaogang, the film was an early scriptwriting credit with Zheng Xiaolong that Beijing Film Studio accepted and that earned a Golden Rooster nomination for Best Screenplay, a credential Feng later described as the door-opener to directing.[12](https://m.thepaper.cn/newsDetail_forward_31682724?from=sohu) A University of Nottingham thesis on Feng's comedy notes that at the start of the 1990s he worked on film and television projects in the humorous style of Wang Shuo, with *After Separation* among them, in response to the industry's state-led commercialization.[13](https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/59927/1/Qi%20Ai%27s%20Revised%20Version%20of%20PhD%20Thesis%20to%20The%20University%20of%20Nottingham%204242345%20%20%20%202020.pdf)
## Release details
The [Rotterdam](https://www.edgepedia.org/rotterdam) festival entry lists the film as a 1993 production of 94 minutes on 35mm, with its international premiere at IFFR 1994, and credits the producer as Century Film Production and the screenplay to Feng Xiaogang.[5](https://iffr.com/en/iffr/1994/films/after-separation) Japanese and Chinese databases give slightly different runtimes, 94, 95 or 100 minutes, and Japanese sources date the Japanese theatrical release to December 7, 1993 under the title 再見のあとで.[4](https://www.allcinema.net/cinema/14834) • [2](https://www.1905.com/mdb/film/61000/) A VHS edition was later distributed in the United States by Nan Hai Co.[14](https://search.worldcat.org/title/After-separation/oclc/34662012)
## References
1. [大撒把 (1992), Douban](https://movie.douban.com/subject/1309235//)
2. [大撒把 After Separation (1992), 1905电影网](https://www.1905.com/mdb/film/61000/)
3. [大撒把, Sogou Baike](https://baike.sogou.com/m/fullLemma?lid=76632105)
4. [再見のあとで (1993), allcinema](https://www.allcinema.net/cinema/14834)
5. [After separation, International Film Festival Rotterdam 1994](https://iffr.com/en/iffr/1994/films/after-separation)
6. [After Separation (1992), NeoDB](https://neodb.social/movie/04JgVUcnzVqfC2hzNJodLB)
7. [再見のあとで, 映画.com](https://eiga.com/movie/67885/)
8. [大撒把 幕后花絮, 1905电影网](https://www.1905.com/mdb/film/61000/feature/)
9. [Summit reviews the early 'golden age' of Chinese cinema, China Services Info](https://www.chinaservicesinfo.com/s/202201/10/WS61db8ae8498e6a12c121cb81/summit-reviews-the-early-golden-age-of-chinese-cinema.html)
10. [选择"留守"还是"大撒把", 新京报 via Sina](https://news.sina.cn/sa/2005-10-11/detail-ikkntiam4802629.d.html?wm=3049_0015)
11. ["京味儿"电影贺岁展连映7天, 新华网](https://www.xinhuanet.com/local/2021-02/04/c_1127065443.htm)
12. [特写｜冯小刚平遥温故, 澎湃新闻](https://m.thepaper.cn/newsDetail_forward_31682724?from=sohu)
13. [Qi Ai (2020), PhD thesis, University of Nottingham](https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/59927/1/Qi%20Ai%27s%20Revised%20Version%20of%20PhD%20Thesis%20to%20The%20University%20of%20Nottingham%204242345%20%20%20%202020.pdf)
14. [大撒把 = After separation, WorldCat](https://search.worldcat.org/title/After-separation/oclc/34662012)
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*Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Films and standalone screen works › Individual films by title and year › Comedy and romantic films (individual works) › Comedies of 1990 to 1994 › Titles symbols to J*
*Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026*
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