This film tells the story of the translator Wang Tiesheng. Before 1949, Wang graduated from Tongji University in Shanghai. He was a student with good morals, intelligence and health. He then served as an assistant professor in the Economics Department of Renmin University. However, he was labelled a “Rightist” in 1957 and was sent to a farm in Tianjin to undertake forced labour. There, he underwent extreme humiliating “reform” and suffered starvation. Later, on a bumpy road as he was being sent to be buried, he miraculously discovered that he was actually alive.