Unexpected success of 'Ne Zha' inspires director Yang Yu to next project

Yang, who has himself struggled for more than a decade in his career, is somewhat of a real-life model for the main role in the film. A native of Luzhou city in Sichuan, Yang was born in a doctors' family. As his parents thought a hospital job would be stable, Yang enrolled into a pharmacy major at Huaxi Medical College, now affiliated to Sichuan University.

But his fascination for animation, sparked by a recommendation from a fellow student when Yang was in third year at the medical college, changed his life. When most of his classmates chose to work as doctors after graduation, Yang stayed at home for three and a half years to make a short animation film, surviving on his mother's monthly pension of about 1,000 yuan.

Yang recalls that period was like "living in a space station", as his routine activities were limited in their small family apartment.

A turning point came in 2009, when Yang's directorial debut, the 16-minute work, See Through, quickly earned recognition after it was released. Aside from online praise, exemplified by a score of 8.7 points out of 10 on Douban, the country's most popular review aggregator, the film got more than 30 awards in China and outside.