Bin Bin (Zhao Wei Wei) has just been fired from his job in a store. He lives in a provincial town in China. Many unemployed men hang around at the local community center, playing pool and shooting the breeze. Bin Bin meets Xiao Ji (Wy Qiong) there, and they are hustled by a fellow who tells them they might get some work at an audition for Mongolian King Liquor ads. The two buddies decide to check it out.
At the audition, Xiao Ji is quite taken with Qiao Qiao (Zhao Tao), who has just been designated the major dancer for the company's promotion shows. He later learns that her boyfriend is a loan shark with some unsavory men working for him. Despite this obstacle, he persists in following her around like a puppy. When he finally gets close to Qiao Qiao, her bold sexual references and easy availability turn him off. When they go dancing, her boyfriend's goons slap him around.
Bin Bin has a girlfriend as well — Yuan Yuan (Zhou Qing Feng). However, they are slowly moving apart thanks to her dreams of studying international trade at Beijing University. They watch a lot of television together and don't talk very much. The closest moment of intimacy comes when they hold hands and sing in unison when one of their favorite music videos comes on the screen. Frustrated with the way things are going in his life, Bin Bin tries to enlist in the army but is rejected for having hepatitis.
Writer and director Jia Zhangke wants to capture the aimlessness and the ennui of these nineteen year olds who live for the present moment and have no plans for tomorrow. Although a television report mentions an American plane in Chinese airspace, the most surprising scene is one in which Bin Bin hears an explosion in the street and wonders whether China is being attacked by United States. The director seems to be implying that America has already taken over the minds and souls of these young men and their girlfriends. They all smoke cigarettes, watch television, and listen to music. The only thing that finally animates Bin Bin and Xiao Ji to action is a Hollywood movie about a pair that decides to rob a bank. In the end, they are worse off than they were in the beginning. They've come up empty in both love and work.
