Beijing Bicycle Review

With the Open Market Reforms of Deng Xiaoping in 1979, Chinese cities have been booming and are subject to an influx of people from the countryside. The hopes of a better life can be found in major cities. Wang Xiaoshuai’s film, Beijing Bicycle, shows the experiences of two teenage boys in Beijing that cross paths because of a high-end mountain bike. One hopes to have a stable life delivering packages with bike, while the other sees it as a way to improve his social standing. Though what the two boys seek is different, both want to better their own lives with the bike because it provides the opportunity to move up in society. Since one boy comes from the countryside while the other is a native of the urban city, consequently how much one of them gains from the bike varies.

The boy from the countryside, Guei, comes to Beijing for a better life where he works as a bicycle courier. At the start of the film, he is issued a brand new mountain bike by his employer and is expected to pay off the cost of the bike over the course of employment. The bike offers Guei a better life through a stable source of income. Unfortunately, what it cannot offer him is the chance to move up the social ladder because of his rural upbringing. The people in the urban cities generally take advantage of people from the countryside. For example, the day Guei believes that he has paid off the company for his bike, the woman collecting the money states that he still owes the company 70 yuan. He is visibly upset because he has been keeping track of his earnings, but the woman insists he still has a debt to pay. It seems like the woman is pocketing some money because she tries to calm him down when he wants to report the discrepancy to the manager. The bike offers Guei a chance to have a better life, however, since he is from the countryside there also a glass ceiling for him.

Jian, on the other hand, is a boy native to Beijing and wants to obtain a better life by improving his social status with the bike. His father has been promising to get Jian a bike for quite some time, but he has not followed through. This time he breaks the promise because Jian’s stepsister needs tuition money. This bike is important to Jian because he wants to court the girl he likes and fit in with the rest of his friends that have their own bikes. Frustrated with broken promises, Jian’s steals the money that his father has been saving and buys the bike stolen from Guei at a secondhand shop. Jian’s desire for the bike over his stepsister’s education speaks to the shift of ideals China was experiencing. Up to that point in his life, even his accomplishments, such as being in the top five of his class, were dedicated to receiving a cool bike to ride with his friends. Ultimately, the urban youth embrace consumerism as a sign of progress because they only know life after the Open Market Reforms, with even traditional values of education being only a mean to obtain material goods. Since he does not need to worry about his next meal, his ideas of a better life stem from the boost in social standing a bike can offer.

The film shows the rapid economic transformation occurring in the urban cities of China with the bicycle being the key element in urban life. To people a bike is essential to live and improve their lives in the cities. However, depending on their background, what they can achieve with the bike may be different. The urban youth view the bike as a source of social standing being deeply entrenched in an increasingly capitalistic society, while people from the countryside see as a mean to make ends meet, though they may hope for more. Everyone wants to have the better life promised by economic reforms, but what can be achieved in the pursuit of this better life demonstrates the widening gap between the urban and rural people since the Open Market Reforms.