Niu Lai the Movie

Niu Lai, the Movie

In 2026, we witnessed another movie Niu Lai (牛来) becoming a viral sensation and a cultural phenomenon for completely different reasons! It was released on August 5th in 245 theaters with no marketing, no trailer, and only a beautifully painted ink-wash poster announcing its release! Some say the ink-wash poster might have given a false impression of the film’s quality! In the first 10 days after release, it collected only 7,000 yuan from fewer than 300 viewers!

The early viewers were shocked! They described the 3D graphics as "disaster-level," "ugly," and "eerie," with stiff character movements and frequent visual glitches. They were often confused by inconsistencies in the movie, the strange voices, and even typos in the subtitles! Many mocked it as looking "worse than AI-generated content", which is a damning critique because the use of AI-generated images has resulted in the main characters of AI micro-dramas looking all alike. Instead of killing the film, the mockery became its saviour! Clips of its dreadful animation went viral on social media by August 14th, and suddenly, everyone wanted to see just how bad it really was. I watched it as well. By late August, the cumulative box office had surpassed 30 million yuan, and it became one of the top 10 highest-grossing Chinese animated films of 2026.

The movie tells the story of a newborn calf Niu Lai in a herd on the move for greener pastures. Niu Lai was born weak and could not stand on his four legs. While lying down, he fell into a dream, which became the focus of the movie. Besides Niu Lai, the Mother Cow and a skylark (云雀) were the main characters inside his dream. In the dream, Niu Lai also encountered a snake, a leopard cub (豹拉), a pack of wolves, and eventually human beings. Niu Lai wanted to play with the snake and was bitten in return. Despite the disapproval of Mother Cow, Niu Lai rescued the leopard cub Baola from hunger, and they became best friends. Subsequently, Baola rescued Niu Lai not once but twice. Mother Cow had to sacrifice herself to the wolf pack to save Niu Lai and Baola. Niu Lai woke up from his dream and managed to stand up on his four legs. The story ended with the Mother Cow introducing Niu Lai to his father.

In the theater, you could hear the audience laughing at the visual glitches, cheering at unintended funny moments, and treating the whole screening like a live comedy talk show. It became an interactive social experience! The viewers embraced the film's imperfections, including its lifeless backdrop, monotonous music, stiff character animations, and deadpan dialogue. One viewer summed up this sentiment perfectly: "You'll regret watching it for 86 minutes, but you'll regret not watching it for a lifetime". For me, watching the movie is like experiencing time-dilation! Every movement of the characters and every thought uttered is in slow motion! The whole story could have been narrated in 10 minutes instead of 86 minutes!

In an interview, Xin Yumeng, the director, acknowledged the film’s technical imperfections. He explained that with a small budget, second-hand equipment, and his self-taught animation skills, he could not refine the technical details, “like animating individual strands of hair.” He consciously chose to prioritize completion over technical sophistication. Finishing a feature-length film was more important than perfecting its pacing. He had neither a marketing plan nor any expectation. He just wanted to release the film. The result was an 86-minute film with a beginning, middle, and end that managed to secure a theatrical release!

It was a grueling 5-year project that began in 2021. Xin Yumeng, a former interior designer with no animation background, decided to make the film out of his love for animated films. It was an attempt to fulfill a long-held dream. The film's creation was a true labor of love, strongly supported by his mother, Sun Lifang, a retiree, who taught herself screenwriting, voice acting, and music composition to help him realize his dream.

One reviewer noted that the film's "crude storytelling and low-quality animation create a sense of 'unfinishedness' that invites audience participation". It acts as a dynamic cultural space where the audience fills in the gaps with their own jokes and emotions, and projects their own meanings onto the film. Stock investors, both Chinese and South Koreans, perceive the Niu Lai movie as a metaphor for the travails they faced in the current ‘bull market’. Gen Z viewers see its technical flaws as a rebellious, "anti-AI" statement. The older generation, on reading that Sun Li Fang was the screenwriter, sees it as the touching story of a mother's love. The movie became a mirror reflecting whatever the audience wanted to see. This ‘gap-filling’ turned a widely panned film into a vibrant cultural phenomenon. The audience did not just watch the Niu Lai movie; they co-recreated it.

When reflecting on the challenges Niu Lai faced in his dream sequence, I see it as depicting the passage that Hainan will have to traverse before it becomes, by 2050, a fully matured, "globally influential" free trade port. This ‘coming of age’ passage will require HNFTP to overcome many challenges ahead! The motherland is fully supporting its development! I hope the international talents will be the ‘skylark’ serving as the ‘guardian angel’ to Hainan along the way!