BETTER DAYS

A bullied teenage girl forms an unlikely friendship with a mysterious young man who protects her from her assailants, all while she copes with the pressures of her final examinations.

Zeroing in on a harmful emphasis on excellence in Chinese society, this thoughtful melodrama almost didn’t see the light of day. When it did, it became a pop phenomenon—thanks in no small part to especially moving performances from Zhou Dongyu and Jackson Yee, two of Chinese cinema’s rising stars.