Educational Media Reviews Online

Zhang’s Diner is the sad story of a young Chinese couple from northeast China who go to Beijing in search of a better life. The plot, in a nutshell, is that they fail, miserably, even though they try hard. This reviewer was surprised to discover in the closing credits that it took three years for the filmmaker to capture their story. While the timeline is true and during the film Zhang’s wife, Xiao bears a child who develops into a plump toddler before it ends, the time factor is too obscure to understand as one watches. It could have been shot in a week or a month. The unfolding story fails entirely to reflect a passage of years.

The principal problem with the film is that it fails to establish a context for the story, or any concrete story line. What this reviewer saw was merely scene after scene of the two protagonists whiling away empty hours in a setting of abject urban poverty. Occasionally, these scenes were interrupted briefly by shots of Zhang cooking, Chinese style, or Zhang and Xiao and, sometimes, the taxicab driver who befriended them and seemed to be their main customer - picking at heaped-up plates of food. Except for the food, which seemed to be plentiful, all else was lacking, especially water, which trickled from a single spigot, sometimes, the couple complain aloud, only after midnight.

We rarely see customers in the diner. The surroundings are bleak. Two small tables are all it contains. Everything is battered and worn, secondhand, and either already broken or at risk of breaking down at any moment. Dirt paths that lead to the diner are bisected by streams of some liquid, possibly flowing sewage. In the heat of summer, insects abound. And the hazards the couple battle aren’t solely physical. The couple contends with resentful neighbors. They fear being arrested because they lack proper papers or enough money to bribe the police. They talk about busloads of illegal migrants from rural areas of the country being picked up and returned to the countryside. Xiao speaks about suicide. One segment shows a police station where Zhang has been taken in which the officials threaten him with loss of his diner if the filming is not stopped. We learn that he is allowed to go back to the diner the next day.

Zhang and Xiao move to another part of Beijing. The friendly cabbie helps our filmmaker find them and their new diner seems to be doing a little better. A few customers are shown being served. Xiao gives birth to a son and viewers get to see the inside of a Beijing hospital. It, too, appears impoverished.

At the end, English subtitles announce that the Zhangs lose everything and return home. Viewers can only pray that it isn’t the end for them.

Not recommended.