Unlike the other films in the Silk Screen series distributed by Columbia TriStar, Beijing Bicycle was not made by a well-known Asian film director. Wang Xiaoshuai is not a veteran art director with the international status of Zhang Yimou (The Road Home), Chen Kaige (The Emperor and the Assassin), Takeshi Kitano (Kikujiro) or Ang Lee  (Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon). He is a member of the Sixth Generation of Chinese film-makers, whose work is grittier and less prone to extravagant artistic gestures.

His film stands apart from the other films in the series in its refusal to pander to Hollywood sensibilities. It doesn’t resort to picturesque landscapes, nostalgia for the past and a soft-centred sentimentality (as did The Way Home and Shower) or blockbuster aesthetics (as did The Emperor and the Assassin and Crouching Tiger).  This is a realist film, set in the present, with no heart-wringing performances from widows, orphans or crusty old men, and no extravagantly staged set pieces. Perhaps for this reason, it did not last long at the box office …

It is a city film, set among the crowded tenements of contemporary Beijing, focusing on the struggles of rural immigrants to the city. Most tellingly, it highlights the prevalence of a new selfishness, a dog-eat-dog mentality that has replaced the former emphasis on collective ideology.

The narrative of the film pivots on one particular bicycle, which accrues symbolic significance and weight. It represents economic success and social prestige. In the process of the film, competition for the bicycle – and its accompanying connotations of material gain and social status – not only assumes the dominant role in the narrative but also turns violent and destructive. It poisons the social fabric of the community, turning friends and neighbours into hostile enemies.

The film’s central characters are two young men – Guei (Cui Lin) and Jian (Li Bin). Initially they are contrasted as opposites. Guei is a lone country lad, new to the city, hard working, honest and ambitious; Jian is a sulky student, who lives at home with his family and seems more privileged and less honest. They both claim the right to ownership of the same bicycle. Initially Guei appears to have the greater moral right: he needs it for his livelihood; Jian is only trying to impress the girl he fancies. It also looks as though Jian has stolen Guei’s bike. But things are not as simple as they seem.

The camera follows the movements of the two through the streets and alleyways of Beijing, on bicycle and on foot. We see Guei conscientiously and doggedly performing his work as courier and searching for his stolen bicycle with equal determination. We observe Jian hiding the bicycle from family and neighbours, attracting then losing his lady-love. When Guei locates and confronts him, Jian receives support from his gang of “mates”, who cruelly taunt Guei and drive him off. But these mates are shown to be good weather friends, ultimately disloyal. The two competitors for the bike are drawn together and shown to be more alike than at first appeared. They are both victims of the callousness and violence of others, both losers and loners.

They are linked in various subtle ways - through narrative developments and visual rhymes. It is revealed that they both need the bicycle and both have a right to it. They are both interested in a girl who appears unattainable; and they are both victims of gang violence. They are also linked through the motif of a cigarette.

The repetitions and rhymes produce an aesthetically satisfying film with a documentary-like basis in street realism. But there is also a certain cool obliqueness in narrative exposition and dramatic presentation. For example, Wang pointedly refuses to show us the scenes of violence, which consistently take place off-screen. The studied style of presentation, which distances us somewhat from the heat of the drama, results in a film that never becomes melodramatic, unlike the films of the Italian neo-realists, who similarly based their films on socio-economic realities and street realism. Comparisons have been made between this film and de Sica’s Bicycle Thieves (Ladri di Biciclette, 1948) but they are very different. It is not just that Wang’s film is set in an other place, and an other time. It is a more politically incisive film, in that it does not provide a sentimental cop-out. The central focus on socio-economic issues and conditions is maintained to the end.

Beijing Bicycle deserves a wider audience. It is a cool and subtle appraisal of social realities in contemporary Beijing made by someone who patently cares about people and who conscientiously and sensitively employs cinematic language to present his case.

Freda Freiberg