Since this work contained positive depictions of gay men, explicit (by Chinese standards) gay sex scenes, and resurrected the ghost of Tiananmen Square, at the time, no mainland Chinese publisher would have published it, nor would the author be safe from government reprisals.

The story is set in Beijing in the late 1980s and early 1990s, and makes vivid reference to the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests and massacre.

[4] In late 1980s, Lan Yu (Liu Ye), a poor architecture student from northeast China, desperately needs money.

While Lan Yu immediately fell in love with Chen Handong, the older man, who was very closeted, wanted no emotional relationship, only sex.

They would not meet again until 4 June 1989, when Chen went looking for Lan Yu, fearing for the youth's safety amid the army's Tiananmen Square crackdown.

Although Chen Handong still could not commit totally to Lan Yu, he now gave the youth time and attention as well as money, a car, and an expensive villa in the Beijing suburbs.

After a whirlwind courtship, Chen Handong married Jingping (Su Jin), a translator who helped him negotiate a successful business deal with the Russians.

With his father dead and no longer able to protect him, Chen Handong faced a long prison term, if not execution.

Writing in The Film Journal, editor Rick A. Curnutte Jr. admired the performances of Hu and Liu noting that they "are dynamic performers, capturing the evocative nature of the relationship beautifully, and they play-off of each other richly, allowing shared ownership of this mature, fragile love affair."