China's constitution guarantees citizens the right to petition Beijing when local courts and officials fail them, and a shantytown grew up near the capital to house the people who came to press their cases. Director Zhao Liang filmed there over roughly a decade, following petitioners who lost jobs, had land confiscated, or were beaten and jailed in their home provinces and now wait, sometimes for over ten years, for a hearing that never comes. The camera stays close to daily life in the petitioner village: makeshift shelters, arguments over money and food, and the slow erosion of hope as cases go nowhere. Local governments do not ignore the petitioners; the film shows enforcers sent from home districts tracking people down in Beijing, beating them, and dragging them back before they can file. What emerges is a portrait of a legal safety valve that functions mainly as a trap, keeping grievances contained rather than resolved, with the people caught inside it aging in place.