The plantation worker Oh Ay Ceng must leave his beloved, Marsiti, after his father arranges for him to marry his boss' daughter Gwat Nio.
[5] The film was based on the best-selling novel of the same name by Kwee Tek Hoay, which had been published over several instalments in Panorama in 1927; this story had later been adapted as a stage play by the Union Dalia Opera.
[1][6] At the time, sound films had been shown in the Dutch East Indies for several years, beginning with Fox Movietone Follies of 1929 and The Rainbow Man (both 1929).
[1] By the following year they had returned with another Chinese-oriented film, Sam Pek Eng Tay, based on the Chinese legend The Butterfly Lovers.
Although the main points of the story remained the same, several of the Chinese names were Indonesianised: Oh Ay Cheng, for example, was renamed Wiranta, while Gwat Nio was changed to Salmah.