A child alone in the snow is not a metaphor here, it is the entire story, unadorned and unbearable. The film strips away everything except one girl's desperate need for shelter, and in that simplicity it finds something most prestige dramas fail at: genuine ache. You watch her small body move through indifference, and the quietness of it becomes the cruelest thing on screen. This is not a film about tragedy performing itself for you. It is a film about a kid trying to find a door that will open.

A young girl is out alone on a snowy night, trying to find somewhere to stay. The film is an alternate take on The Little Match Girl, animated in a Chinese style, and here the girl sells candles rather than matches. Beyond that change, the adaptation also reworks the original tale's story. The result is a drama built around a child left out in the winter cold.