NOT ONE LESS was directed by Zhang Yimou and released in early 1999.
The movie is set in the present, in a small village in Hebei province. When the teacher in the village is called home to take care of a relative, the village mayor hires Wei Minzhi as a substitute. Thirteen-year-old Wei is barely older than her students, and her teaching skills are nonexistent. But her stubbornness and determination know no bounds. Except writing a text on the blackboard for the students to copy, Wei's pedagogical methodology seems largely consist of locking the students in the classroom and guarding the door from the outside. This works until troublemaker Zhang Huike is sent to work in the nearby city to work off his parent's debt. Wei now has a mission: to go to the city, bring Zhang back, and thus claim her ten yuan bonus that the teacher offers her if all twenty-eight students in the class are still there when he returns, and "not one less."
With the help of some kind people, Wei finally finds the boy and both return the village with chalk donated by the warm-hearted.
It’s a movie with a happy ending, but the haunting image and the wave of pity were tangible. When Wei fruitlessly hunts for Zhang Huike on the bewildering streets of the provincial metropolis, is almost unbearable. There're about 4 million children have been forced to leave school through poverty in China. It’s a movie with a cultural resonance. [Edit by="liliwang on May 7, 5:15:26 PM"][/Edit]
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