Beijing Bicycle

Winner of a 2002 Silver Bear at Berlin for its director, Wang Xiaoshuai, Beijing Bicycle, from both its title and central motif, courts comparisons to that neorealist behemoth, Vittorio De Sica's Bicycle Thieves (1948). This is not unfounded. The simple crux of the story and its narrative realisation is almost identical - working-class man needs bicycle to work in society economically rebuilding itself, it gets nicked. And in his search throughout the city to retrieve it many critiques of the social reality that he inhabits are revealed, as well as the essentials of human nature. There are many further thematic and stylistic reasons to draw parallels between this paradigm of Sixth Generation Chinese filmmaking and the Italian post-war classic.

Set in contemporary Beijing, Guei (Cui Lin) is fresh from the country. He finds employment as a delivery boy. If he works hard enough, he will be able to buy the bicycle, essential for the job. One day, when he has nearly finished paying for it, it is stolen. On the other side of town, Jian, a schoolboy (Li Bin), has got himself a new bike and rides around happily alongside his classmates. After searching the city, Guei discovers Jian now stakes ownership of the bike that he had marked as his. Guei needs the bike for economic survival; Jian needs it for social acceptance. Can they learn to share?

The titular Beijing and bicycle are almost synonymous. According to the film's director, "The bicycle may be only a material symbol, but it is also a symbol of China". This is seen in the shots of Beijing's streets where it seems everyone is riding one. Still the most commonplace mode of transport, it acts as a means and a metaphor for getting through everyday life. Guei, performing the reverse movement of his parents' generation, has come to the city with hope for a better life, believing his new job, embodied by the bike, offers social - as well as actual - mobility. This mirrors the emotions of the protagonist in Bicycle Thieves. "This job takes you to nice places," says Guei's friend from the kiosk, who doesn't like his own bike because he has "to pedal hard". We follow Guei's travails with the camera at eye-level to the spokes, and we look up with him in awe at the big city. The sense of power his new bike/life gives him though is shown when he first sets off; ! he overtakes everyone else on the road. Guei needs the bike whereas Jian wants it. For him, it's a matter of pride, because for Jian's family the bicycle still represents a coveted social status, and being of the new Chinese rebellious youth, and thus representing today's standards, he overrides his father's supremacy when he says they can't afford one. So, as in Bicycle Thieves, this is a society driven by motives born out of poverty and a fading authoritarian rule, which explains, though doesn't justify, how stealing leads to stealing back.

The director also sees owning a bicycle as a rites of passage - "The bicycle has a special meaning for China" - and equates it with first love. See how Guei spends so much time polishing and caressing his bike and how he holds it lovingly in his arms when it is finally destroyed. Or how Xiao uses her bike to flirt - "My chain is loose…" - enabling her and Jian to ride along as a couple. Their romance is at once destroyed when Jian is no longer in possession of the bike so believes he's lost his self-worth.

"The bicycle has always been an icon of Beijing and, in fact of China," suggests Wang. Beijing, the capital and China's fastest-growing city physically represents a country in a state of change. The film portrays a place where the gleaming skyscrapers cloud the village-like, back alleys with their vignettes of men performing martial arts or sitting on street corners playing chess. This simple imagery reflecting a way of life is a characteristic of neorealism, too. Do they represent the gradually fading close-knit communities of yesteryear? The film remains ambiguous on what this means; these men behaving traditionally are unmoved by the new generation's bike chase in the finale. The chase scene, incidentally, is so dramatic because the director made sure to get an exciting angle on it every time by using a different location. The editing of this section is typical Sixth Generation, fast-paced to reflect contemporary urban life. Wang believes, "These contradictory and chaotic images represent what's interesting about China today".

Does the plot mirror the story of twentieth-century Chinese culture? Guei has been beaten by Jian's gang for being an outsider in moves reminiscent of the cultural revolution's group mentality - "Some nerve stealing our bike" - and just when the boys have resolved their petty power struggles and adopted an egalitarian approach to sharing the bicycle, they are attacked by a gang who, with their Western-style clothes and branded bikes, possibly represent the power of capitalist consumerism.

Neither Guei's nor Jian's aspirations for the bike with its connotations of hope for a better life are enough. It is finally destroyed for good. Like Bicycle Thieves, the ending is bleak. The final image is telling; Guei disappears into the crowds anonymously, carrying the battered bike, his story of defeat, one among thousands. Yet, we knew this from the outset; the individual is subsumed as the faces of the interviewees for Guei's job merge into one. Who is the real bicycle thief? Perhaps it's the out-for-profit corporation who made Guei pay for the bike in the first place? His friend warns him of city greed, "They play you when they pay you", and his manager does not realise the life-dependency, both literal and metaphorical, that owning a bicycle infers: "Is it worth it, a damn bike?"

Reviewed by Nicci Tucker