"In the Octagon Cage" is a sports inspirational film directed and acted by Wang Baoqiang, the film is based on real events, telling the story of a middle-aged man Xiang Tenghui leading a group of children to break through the encirclement of fate and find a way out of life.
The plot of the film mainly revolves around Xiang Tenghui, who was once a skilled and promising martial artist, but was banned from the competition and imprisoned for injuring someone for taking illegal drugs for mistrusting his coach. After being released from prison, he became a battlefield boss, but his life was not smooth and he was in debt.
By chance, Xiang Tenghui re-introduced himself to martial arts and established a children's fighting club. He found some wild children who grew up in the remote mountains and often fought and robbed, and taught them boxing, hoping to find a way out for them in this way.
Xiang Tenghui began to teach them martial arts, and pretended to be wealthy, and negotiated a martial arts performance with the bar owner, Boss Li, and successfully demonstrated the children's fighting skills. Boss Li was initially reluctant to help and only pursued his own interests, but later became attracted to the children's martial arts and showed concern for them, agreeing to the children's martial arts performances at the bar.
The children fought each other in the octagon, and the audience cheered, hoping that the children would fight to the death and fight more intensely. Xiang Tenghui was afraid that the children would be injured because of this, so he asked the children to fake a beating. When Su Mu and Ma Hu among the children were attacked by thugs, the audience and the bar owner were indifferent, and only Xiang Tenghui resolutely rushed into the octagon cage to rescue them.
This sequence shows the symbolism of the iron cage trapping them, suggesting the people trapped by life. As the martial arts got better and better, the children's performances finally caught the attention of some. Xiang Tenghui stepped forward to rescue the beaten children, and the octagonal cage became a symbol of their salvation and captivity.