Twin Sisters (Zimei hua) dir. / sc. Zheng Zhengqiu With Hu Die, Zheng Xiaoqiu, Tan Zhiyuan, Xuan Jinglin Shanghai: Mingxing Film, 1933.

Like many leftist films of the same period, *Twin Sisters* exhibits a concern for social justice by contrasting the lives of two siblings. In depicting people with wealth and power as decadent, corrupt, cruel and evil, and poor folk as honest, caring, and hardworking, the film takes a clear anti-establishment stand. Mr Zhao is an illegal arms dealer who seldom stays with his wife and their twin daughters, Dabao and Erbao. After Zhao's release from jail, he is eager to leave the village again. Mrs Zhao, fearing she will not be able to support both kids, begs him to take one of them with him, so Zhao takes Erbao. Years later Erbao has become the seventh wife of a warlord, whereas Dabao is married to a carpenter and still lives in the village with her mother. The collapse of the rural economy forces them to flee the countryside and move to the city. Erbao also happens to be living in the city and is looking for a nanny for her newborn son. Dabao comes for the job, even though her own baby is also in need of care. The twin sisters--one a mistress, the other a servant--do not even recognize each other. One day Dabao's husband falls off a roof while working. To pay his hospital bills, Dabao begs Erbao to give her a loan; instead, she gets a slap in the face from Erbao. In desperation, Dabao steals a gold ornament from Erbao's baby, but she is seen by Erbao's sister-in-law. Dabao panics and tries to escape, but she accidentally stumbles over a huge vase which then falls on Erbao's sister-in-law's head and kills her. Dabao is arrested for murder and put in jail. Her mother comes to visit her in prison and accidentally runs into Mr Zhao, her former husband, who is in charge of Dabao's case. Zhao is now the garrison commander because he has given Erbao to the warlord. Mrs Zhao threatens that if he does not release Dabao, she will reveal his past. Since the victim is the warlord's sister, Zhao has received orders from him to punish Dabao severely: therefore, Zhao does not want to jeopardize hisfuture by giving Dabao a light sentence. In the end, it is Erbao who brings her twin sister and mother to see the warlord, leaving Mr Zhao alone in his office.

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