Successor 2024

Jiye Bochen Xiao is introduced as the younger son of Chenggang Ma Teng Shen and Chunlan Li Ma, born to a second wife, in a world where wealth and ritual mask a calculated plan to secure the family business. The film opens in 2017 with two teachers visiting Jiye’s house, and their shock at the apparent state of extreme poverty sets the stage for a deeper look into his origins through a series of revealing flashbacks. The plot follows a parent’s deliberate attempt to mold Jiye into a capable heir, even as the truth of his upbringing remains carefully hidden.

Chenggang Ma, a wealthy man in Xihong City, believes his eldest son is too spoiled to carry the family forward. To ensure a worthy successor, he shifts his attention to Jiye, the son of his second wife, Chunlan [Li Ma]. The name Jiye, meaning “Inherit the Business,” foreshadows the expectation that this child must grow into a version of the family’s legacy. Under this plan, the family relocates to an old family home, and Jiye is forced to abandon sweets, technology, and the luxuries of his former life. A professional nanny is hired to enforce the rigorous regime and even acts as Jiye’s grandmother, ensuring that every habit supports discipline and perseverance. The family maintains the illusion of poverty, not out of genuine need but as a deliberate scaffolding to cultivate hard work, knowledge, budgeting, physical fitness, and resilience.

To sustain the ruse, discreet staff are stationed across Xihong City to interact with Jiye at carefully chosen moments—buying vegetables, practicing English, and ensuring punctuality for school. Hidden doors and secret compartments throughout the house reveal the constant, watchful presence of those who manage his world, washing clothes, preparing meals, and monitoring him around the clock. The life Jiye leads is a tightly choreographed performance, designed to shape him into the heir his father envisions.

A dramatic turn arrives when Jiye is kidnapped by his older brother, Ma Jiye [Pengyuan Shi], who tries to spoil him with luxurious baths and extravagant gifts. After Jiye is rescued, the family discovers that he has secretly purchased a tablet and has been playing video games—an act that prompts a chastened yet furtive attempt to recover the money by scavenging hundreds of bottles from a Daxiang team soccer match, a nod to Shen’s earlier work Hello Mr. Billionaire and a reminder of the city’s interconnected cinematic world. Jiye also befriends Zhang Feifei [Jackie Li], whose presence adds another layer to his life outside the carefully curated household.

By 2024, Jiye is nearing the end of high school, in his senior year and preparing for the Gaokao, with the looming dream of Qingbei University. Despite the ongoing surveillance and the familiar bike that has carried him through years, he begins to openly question whether his destiny is truly his own. At school, his suspicions about control meet resistance, and on his way home he spots the nanny playing basketball. The family distracts him, and later they pretend that she has died, intensifying Jiye’s sense that the world around him is built on secrets.

Feifei Zhang shares another crucial truth: she has seen Jiye’s parents at their original, posh apartment, where their older brother still resides. Jiye confronts the illusion by visiting the space and confronting the family’s carefully constructed narrative. The plan surrounding the older brother is revealed as an effort to climb significant peaks, including a journey into the Himalayas, while Jiye’s own resolve is tested in a mix of endurance and rebellion. The Gaokao day becomes a turning point, and Jiye chooses to stray from the predetermined path by sketching a Dove on his answer sheet and leaving the examination hall early. He then descends into the underground planning room that holds the family’s childhood secrets. His father’s initial congratulations give way to anger as he berates Jiye for abandoning the long arc of the family project, while Jiye insists that he must chart his own future.

In the final stretch, Jiye runs toward a pond where a group of children play, while everyone else stands by—watching as his choice to govern his fate unfolds. The brother’s Himalayan ambition is juxtaposed with Jiye’s decision to redefine success on his own terms, a moment framed by the recurring image of bottles gathered from past endeavors and a marathon in Paris that mirrors his persistent, determined journey toward autonomy. The film closes on Jiye continuing to confront the future on his own terms, choosing to live with the consequences of his decisions rather than simply inheriting a legacy.

• Feifei Zhang’s arc adds a human touch to Jiye’s world, with Zhang Feifei Jackie Li entering as a tangible friend outside the family’s gaze.

• The unseen forces of Jiye’s upbringing—Ma Chenggang [Teng Shen], Chunlan [Li Ma], and the ever-present grandmother figure—shape the moral questions at the heart of the story.

• The Dove on the Gaokao sheet becomes a symbol of Jiye’s choice to seek freedom, even as the system attempts to keep him in place.

This reimagined, carefully observed tale blends family duty, wealth and power, and a young man’s pursuit of self-determination into a sprawling narrative that remains grounded in the characters’ intimate, human stakes.