Best-seller writer Guo Jingming's directorial debut talks about youths of rich families, but the war of words that has followed its release has been between generations.

The film, Tiny Times, stars popular young actors, such as Yang Mi and Kai Ko, and portrays the lives and loves of four young women in Shanghai who study at a university that seems as beautiful as a palace and who live in a dormitory that looks like a princess' castle.

The film, which trounced Hollywood blockbuster Man of Steel at the box office, taking 200 million yuan ($32.38 million) in just three days, is Guo's answer to Gossip Girl and Sex and the City - only without the sex.