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Beijing Taxi is a feature-length documentary that vividly portrays the ancient capital of China undergoing a profound transformation. The intimate lives of three taxi drivers are seen through a humanistic lens as they navigate a quickly morphing city, confronting modern issues and changing values. The three protagonists radiate a warm sense of humanity despite the struggles that each faces in adapting to new realities of life in the modern city.
With stunning imagery of Beijing and a contemporary score rich in atmosphere, Beijing Taxi communicates a visceral sense of the common citizens’ persistent attempts to grasp the elusive. The 2008 Summer Olympic Games serve as the backdrop for Beijing Taxi’s story, a coming out party for a rising nation and a metaphor for Chinese society and its struggles to reconcile enormous contradictions while adjusting to a new capitalist system that can seem foreign to some in the Communist-ruled and educated society. Candid and perceptive in its filming approach and highly cinematic and moody in style, Beijing Taxi takes us on a lyrical journey through fragments of a society riding the bumpy roads to modernization. Though its destination unknown, the drivers continue to forge ahead.
An official selection fo the SXSW Film Festival.
“Interesting and Poignant… An attractive and seamless set of images of working-class Chinese life… Elegantly Framed”- The New York Times
“An Outstanding Ride… dips us under the mainstream media’s radar screen and places us in the seat of a journey through the capital of China: a lyrical, funny and at times bitter journey… It’s gritty and it’s beautiful; the focus on the subjects is sharp, yet you also get a sense of the larger China… “- Huffington Post
