The literal translation of the title of this movie is: The people who lost his memory.Don't know if this movie is related to the novel with the same title or not, because the two are so different in the way the story played out, however, the message delivered by both the novel and this movie is identical: both criticized the disastrous Cultural Revolution launched by Mao.Remember the fact that when this movie was made, China was still dominated by the hard line conservatives who despite their hatred of the Cultural Revolution, still revered Mao, and this maybe why this movie had to be altered so much in order to avoid being banned.