The Crossing () is a two-part 2014 Chinese-Hong Kong epic historical romance-war drama (part 1) and disaster film (part 2) directed by John Woo and written by Hui-Ling Wang. The film stars Zhang Ziyi, Takeshi Kaneshiro, Song Hye-kyo, Huang Xiaoming, Tong Dawei and Masami Nagasawa. The film is based on the sinking of the Taiping in 1949. The incident led to the deaths of over 1,500 passengers and crew. The film's first part was released in China on December 2, 2014. Part two was released on July 30, 2015.
Plot
Part 1:
In a battle between the Chinese National Revolutionary Army and the Imperial Japanese Army in Manchuria during World War II, Major general Lei Yifang (Huang Xiaoming) personally leads an attack over the objections of his subordinates. The charge overruns Japanese lines and wins the day; Dr. Yen Zekun (Takeshi Kaneshiro), an ethnic Chinese field medic conscripted into the Japanese army from then-Japanese Taiwan, is captured. Lei is promoted to lieutenant general, while Dr. Yen is shipped off to a prison camp in Fengtian. On the POW train, Yen reads a letter from his Japanese paramour Masako (Masami Nagasawa).
A few years later during the resumption of the Chinese Civil War, Yu Zhen (Zhang Ziyi), a poor, illiterate young woman volunteers as an orderly at a Nationalist hospital in Shanghai. She dreams of reuniting with her boyfriend Yang Tianhu, who is off fighting the Communists. Meanwhile, General Lei catches the eye of wealthy debutante Zhou Yunfen (Song Hye-kyo) at a charity event put on by her father Zhou Zhongding and mother Yuan Shenglan. Despite her mother's warnings not to accept the attention of soldiers, she dances with Lei, their chemistry obvious for the entire room to see; months later, they marry.
The next year, Yu Zhen meets signal corps sergeant Tong Daqing outside of the same photography studio Lei and Zhou used for their wedding. Sergeant Tong has hired Yu and a borrowed baby to have a photograph taken together as a family as proof of marriage, which would provide his parents at home with more food rations. After they take the photos, a student anti-war protest in front of the studio is violently dispersed by police and soldiers. During the chaos, Dr. Yen enters the photography studio, presents separate photos of himself and Masako, and asks the proprietor to create an altered photo that will make it look like he and her were in a photo together.
Tong and Yu take refuge in a noodle shop, where Tong talks about why he joined the army. Yu asks about the Republic of China Army's soldier identification numbers. Tong tells her that as long as she knows his ID number, she will be able to find him, dead or alive. She smiles, thinking of her lover, but Tong misinterprets this as her having feelings for him. Tong, late for his departure, boards a truck with the rest of his unit and tells Yu to memorize his unit number. Yu returns to the photography studio and orders a copy of the picture of her with Tong and "their" baby.
Zhou, now pregnant, tells General Lei that she has reservations about his plans to send her away to Taiwan. He quiets her fears, though she asks him not to see her off out of superstition. Zhou's parents see her and her sister off on the Taiping, along with many of Shanghai's elite. Zhou has her cousin take a picture of her, capturing Lei in the background as he has come in secret to watch her departure before he leaves for the front.
Sergeant Tong is admiring his 'family portrait' when his fellow troops notice how pretty his 'wife' is. They pass the photo around and listen, rapt as Tong spins yarns about Yu. Meanwhile, Yu struggles to get employment and is seen eating discarded fruit and sleeping under a bridge.
Dr. Yen, who was on the Taiping with the Zhou sisters, disembarks with them at the Port of Keelung in Taiwan, where they are greeted with a military band and Nationalist flags lining the streets. He explains to an official that he was in Shanghai procuring medical supplies for his practice. The official, seeing that he is a native of Taiwan, asks where Yen learned the Guānhuà he is conversing in instead of the local language, Taiwanese Hokkien. After the questioning, Yen meets his brother and returns to his family home. His mother, a midwife, is burning letters sent to Yen by Masako. Zhou arrives at a Japanese-style estate, where she is welcomed by A-man, the Taiwanese maid. She starts to pen a letter to her husband.