“DAWN OF NEW HOPES.”
(Synopsis.)
In a tenement house of a certain city, there live several families, each facing a different life problem.
The front room ranked as the best part of the house is occupied by a certain Mr. Li, the principal tenant, a middle aged business man who acquires his riches mostly by skinning on others through tricky means. Here he stays with his pretty and young mistress known as "Mrs. Li", and his good-for-nothing young son named Charlie. Being too busy to keep constant company with his young mistress, Li has to detail his son Charlie to perform the watching duty, Mrs. Li is lonely and unhappy, but luckily through her acquaintance with an understanding young Wan, she is able to obtain some life's consolation.
Three other tenants occupy the rear part of the house. Mr. and Mrs. Chung live with their son and daughter, together with Miss Kung, the younger sister of Mrs. Chung. Chung has been unemployed already for three months, which makes it extremely difficult for Mrs. Chung to maintain the family in shape, in spite of her best efforts. Kung is approaching her twenties. She has tried in vain looking for jobs, and feels quite uncomfortable to live in the house as a burden to Chung.
An old man Chian lives in the back room, suffering acute lung disease and unable to work. His wife has just passed away, leaving him many children to feed. His life problem is even more
difficult and miserable.
In another room lives a young man named Wu, an office worker of limited means, but a sober and
honest young man. Unmarried, he is very friendly with Miss Kung.
Chung tries to land himself in a job. Through the introduction of his friend Chen, he is finally ohered for one whereby a cash guarantee of $500 will be required. Chung succeeds to procure the sum with effort, but later to his utter disappointment, he finds Chen suddenly disappeared together with the $500 bond he furnished. Chung now realizes that Chen's preposition is but a pretext to hook his $500.
A thunder storm now rages in the tenement house, which hits almost all living there. Chung and Chian, disappointed with life, both attempt to commit suicide. Mrs. Li becomes disgusted with Li, eloped with the young Wan, but Wan also turns out to be a cheat. Kung is forced to work in the dancing hall as a dancing hostess, badly insulted by many young villians, including also Charlie, the son of Li, taking
adventage of her helpless situation. Thoroughly disgusted with life, Kung also seeks the life's end by plunging into the deep sea. She is saved in time by the young Wu.
The lives of all those miserable ones, however, are not doomed here. Besides Kung, Chung and Chian are also saved by those who are close and dear to them. All are convinced that suicide will not solve the most complicated problem of life, and that new hopes are always dawning on them.
The only one who is really disappointed and duly punished by life, perhaps, is Mr. Li, who returns home one day to find his pretty and young mistress deserted him, and his son being chased after by the police as a wanted criminal. Instead of seeing any new prospects in his life, he is fainted to the grond.
——END——