Beijing
Bicycle, winner of
the Silver Bear Award for Best Picture at the 2001 Berlin
International Film Festival, adds new dimensions to a situation
outlined in Vittorio de Sica's 1948 neorealist classic, The
Bicycle Thief. In the case of Beijing Bicycle, a
young man named Guei (Cui Lin) a new "import" from the
countryside who is desperate to work his way up from poverty, is one
day's pay away from owning his mountain bike outright when it is
stolen. As in de Sica's film, this incident spells potential
disaster for Bicycle's protagonist: he not only can no longer
work as a bicycle courier, but he must also reimburse the courier
company for the cost of the bicycle; it was still the company's
property. He must find it. Having extracted a promise from his
manager that he can keep his job if he can return the bike, the
young man goes in search of it. When he finds it, he discovers, to
his surprise, that the thief, Jian (Li Bin) is not a professional
criminal, but something else altogether: another teenager, much like
himself, whose middle-class parents are making painful financial
sacrifices to put their children through private schools; there is
very little money left over for luxuries. Jian not only feels
excluded from a social circle populated by students from wealthier
families, but he has a crush on one of the girls, the attractive and
intelligent Qin (Zhou Xin). Eager to feel as if he were truly part
of the group, Jian somehow finds the money to purchase the courier's
bicycle at a flea market, unaware of its origins. Not wanting to
lose all of the privileges he has gained through the possession of
the bicycle, Jian uses his gang of friends to keep it in his
possession.
De Sica's film concentrated upon the search itself, and the psychological toll that it takes upon the relationship between father and son; Bicycle's main focus is the relationship between thief and owner: both, as it turns out, are victims in some way or another. The courier requires the bicycle for his very survival, but the teenager does as well, though not to the same degree. Although he is rightfully seen as a somewhat typically self-pitying adolescent, director Wang Xiao-Shuai also persuades the audience to understand the nature of his victimization. Surrounded by wealthier classmates, and struggling to keep up appearances (under the fear of being shunned and potentially prevented from meeting his parents' high social and economic expectations), his motivation for possessing the bicycle is understandable, though no less wrong.
Review by Carrie Gorringe · Nitrate Online
