Monday, December 16, 2019
Beijing Bicycle
Wang Xiaoshuai's film Beijing Bicycle is ultimately a film about the effects of "modernization" in China. I'd like you to read this essay and discuss the film's narrative and what you feel is the implied meaning of the film as a whole. Choose one scene and analyze the scene fully and cinematically and tell me why you chose the scene and what is the scene's relationship to the film as a whole.
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Beijing Bicycle is a film about the duality of life in China during the late 90s and early 2000s. As China began to modernize and industrialize at a rapid pace, its citizens, who only thirty years prior were under communist control, had to adapt along with it. The film follows two teenage boys from exceedingly different socio-economic backgrounds. The first boy, Guei, is from a rural background. He has recently moved to the city in order to pursue a job with a delivery company. Right before he can pay off the bike he has been using for his job, it is stolen and sold to another boy, Jian. Jian lives in the city and attends school, a luxury that Guei does not have. While Jian does not steal the bike, he does steal money from his father that is meant for his sister’s education in order to buy it. Desperate for his job back, Guei tracks down the bike and arguments over ownership between the two parties ensue. I think that the implied meaning of the film as a whole is the massive difference between economic classes in China. Cinematically, this is depicted throughout the entire film by contrasting the two storylines. An example of this is the scene in which Jian and Xiao, a girl he likes, are riding their bikes together after school. The scene is a montage that seems to be straight out of a romantic comedy. Their ride home is romanticized almost to an extreme. Jian is shown as carefree as he laughs and spreads his arms wide as he rides his bike. Alternatively, the bike means something drastically different to Guei. For Guei, the bike is a means of making ends meet; it is his livelihood. For Jian, it is a symbol of status and popularity (as we see later in the film when everyone is crowding around a popular kid showing off his bike). This represents the socio-economic divide perfectly, the working class that lives from paycheck to paycheck versus the middle to upper class that has clear privileges such as attending school and pursuing various relationships.
ReplyDeleteI mostly agree with what Richard Leterri has to say about China.The characters Guei and Jian in the movie have a fight which seems primarily symbolic for the fight between people from the country and people who live in the city.If this is true I do not agree with the statement that Jian’s motivation are entirely consistent with the city culture.His motivations to fit in with youth culture might match what the average city teenager might have wanted but realistically a supposedly hard working student such as Jian wouldn’t have the time to direct the level of dedication that Jian shows towards his social life.If Jian necessities were compared to Guei like the article stated than Jian wouldn’t have been portrayed as so hedonistic.I think the film is more of a criticism than a comparison.Guei fights over the bike because he has no way of establishing himself whereas because Jian who is already economically supported has no necessity for social establishment.
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