Part One: Rust

"In the midst of rumors and uncertainty, the employees of the Tie Xi complex continue working as they wait to hear about the future of their jobs. Treatment for lead poisoning is part of the usual routine; fishing, cards, and saxophone music combat boredom in the hospital.  factory workers and managers have common financial worries, with only a trickle of orders coming in to the copper, zinc, and lead smelting facilities. A group of office staff celebrate the new year together; they toast to prosperity and happiness.

A ghostly revolution song plays throughout the loudspeakers as workers doggedly perform tasks without safety equipment.  Small injuries are frequent and so are cigarette breaks.  There is dust and smoke from the furnaces; water from leaking pipes freezes into waterfalls.  As bankruptcy approaches, abandoned goods are fair game for salvaging.  The atmosphere is one of loss and resignation as the men bathe after their shifts."

~ from the packaging 

The Series:

"In West of the Tracks, filmmaker Wang Bing documents the slow, inevitable death of an obsolete manufacturing system. Between 1999 and 2001 he meticulously filmed the lives of the last factory workers, a class of people once promised glory during the Chinese revolution. Now trapped by economic change, the workers become deeply moving film heroes in this modern epic. The film is an engrossing portrait of Chinese society in transition. Cahiers du Cinema compares Wang Bing to the great Russian writers and calls his film 'a masterful production, an open file on realism.' West of the Tracks opens up a new and radical era in cinematography." ~

DER, Publisher