Due to the coronavirus pandemic the team that made Fire on the Plain were unable to come to San Sebastián to present the film. Its director, Zhang Ji, spoke to the press via a video link. He confessed that the pandemic had delayed several of the production stages as well as the premiere of the film. In the end they realised that the biggest problem that they faced was not choosing the actors or debating on what was going to be left in the final cut, but ensuring that the project could go ahead. The film is based on the novel “Moses on the Plain” by Shuang Xue Tao that had
a huge impact in China and another major problem was deciding which parts to leave out without losing the spirit of the book as the original text couldn’t be fitted into a single film. This took them more than five years. The filmmaker also said that the two time periods in which the film takes place: 1997 and 2005, were not only key periods for understanding the changes that led to Chinese society to grow so dramatically but were also crucial stages in his own personal life.