East Palace, West Palace (Dong gong xi gong)

The street urinals of a public park in the Chinese capital have become the favoured meeting point for homosexuals. A Lan, a sensitive young writer, likes strolling in the park. During a police raid, he finds himself at headquarters suffering a fit by the book " interrogation. The questioning of A Lan quickly transforms into an unexpected reminiscence of his tumultuous life: his childhood, parents, school, first sexual experience, obligatory state work in the countryside, and then, a slow drift into the quest for true love. These brief intimate glimpses of A Lan's life blur the interrogating officer's feelings for his prisoner. A strange love story unfolds.