With just two films to her name (in addition to co-producing the Golden Bear-winning Black Coal, Thin Ice), Vivian Qu has become one of China’s most prominent female filmmakers. Her long-awaited follow-up to the excellent Angels Wear White (which premiered in 2017’s Venice competition) once again shines a light on the plight of young women in contemporary Chinese society and reunites her with many of the same cast and crew. With a noticeably larger budget at her disposal, Girl on Wire is the most polished but least hard-hitting film she’s made thus far; while it’s likely to draw a wider audience, true fans will be disappointed.
Told in interlocking timelines, the decades-spanning story centers on twenty-something Tian Tian (Liu Haocun) and her cousin Fang Si (Wen Qi). The two girls grew up like sisters, though their relationship is fraught with familial tension that eventually drove them apart. Tian Tian, stuck in their rural hometown and the vicious cycle of debt and drug abuse passed down from her father, is now a single mother who falls prey to a crime ring; Fang Di went to Beijing to pursue an acting career, but has to settle for the grueling work as a stuntwoman. When Tian Tian managed to escape from captivity and travel to Beijing to find the only person she trusts, both girls must face their complicated history and figure out where to go from there.
Qu is a gifted screenwriter who excels at using genre elements as building blocks to tell stories with social relevance. Her debut feature Trap Street is a gripping tale of paranoia that tackles the omnipotence of the Chinese state. Angels Wear White, meanwhile, is crafted like a mystery and investigates societal complicity in the violence against women. With this latest, you can tell the same intent and ambition are there: Qu leans ever further into genre filmmaking, incorporating action, crime noir, and martial arts to spice up the storytelling, while thematic focus is very much on the exploitation of young women in all walks of life.
Here, the final script clearly needs more work. In depicting the heroines’ shared dysfunctional family, Qu resorts to the easiest character tropes with Tian Tian’s drug-addicted, debt-saddled father and his apologetic, weak-minded sister (Fang Di’s mother). Their toxic interactions, while undoubtedly tragic, feel pointedly trite. The same can be said about the development of Tian Tian, whose journey from a frightened little girl to bitter, rebellious teen who one day finds herself hooked on needles with a baby daughter to feed evokes meager surprise. The three villains who chase her all the way to Beijing are little more than one-dimensional caricatures, their goals never entirely clear, their methods not particularly menacing. Without a compelling story that conveys what’s at stake, the film struggles to inspire some emotional response when the protagonists finally decide to go their own way.
Notably, the theme of flying is featured throughout, from Tian Tian’s obsession with birds to Fang Di’s seemingly heroic, actually painful flights through the air being strapped on wire. But while the metaphor for the girls’ desire to break free couldn’t be communicated any more clearly, execution is rather heavy-handed, culminating in a final shot that flails rather than soars.
Qu’s formidable directorial prowess is still on display in passages. The opening sequence follows Tian Tian’s desperate getaway and conjures heart-pounding dread with the help of some harrowing camerawork and music. And seeing Fang Di at work, being dropped into icy water over and over again for the perfect shot, expresses a chilly indictment of inhumanity without saying anything. The film sadly can’t sustain the tension. Despite its brisk pace propelled by flashbacks and time jumps, there’s a distinct lack of momentum that weighs the narrative down.
Playing Tian Tian, Liu fares the best among the cast. Even though the flawed material does not allow for full-fledged performances with arcs and character beats, she capably brings notes of the luckless girl’s personality––her willfulness, kindness, and deep sadness––to life.
A reverse correlation between resources and filmmaking quality is nothing new. We see it all the time with acclaimed indie directors who strike out on their first studio gig. On top of investor expectations and requirements, Chinese filmmakers must also deal with state scrutiny that comes with a higher profile, which often leads to a sanitization or watering down of the stories being told. Girls on Wire feels like the product of such compromises. It tackles dark, thought-provoking subject matter but takes out the sharp edges. With Guan Hu and Black Dog, we saw that it’s possible for those who’ve gone mainstream to get their groove back. Hopefully that’ll be next for the great Vivian Qu.
Girls on Wire premiered at the 2025 Berlinale.