Fallen City follows the survivors of the 2008 Sichuan earthquake to embark on a journey in search of hope, meaning and identity. Zeroing in on three broken families, the film explores the hearts and minds of ordinary rural Chinese forced to rebuild their lives in an empty world. A devoted father, a divorced older woman, and a runaway teenage boy, each on their own journey, become a collective image of the Chinese people, struggling to their place in a new China torn between tradition and modernity.