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A senior executive of a food delivery platform drove his car and hit a food delivery man who was in a hurry to deliver the food. The car accident shook two families. In the violent collision, people's hearts also approached each other and tried to understand each other. The film "Another Day Full of Hope" released on August 16 started with a traffic accident and touched all aspects of social life.

Accidents require a determination of responsibility, but life is not easy to discuss right and wrong. From the perspective of Wei Li, a senior executive of the food delivery company, he was driving normally, and it was the deliveryman who exceeded the speed limit and ran a red light; for the family of Chen Jinpeng, the deliveryman who was seriously injured, this was a huge tragedy. Behind the tragedy is another fact: not long ago, Wei Li proposed to shorten the delivery time of the deliverymen for the sake of performance.

The algorithm trapped the deliveryman in the system, and the people who used the algorithm could not escape the fate of being abandoned. Shortly after the car accident, Wei Li was "optimized". The suffering of middle-aged, unemployment, and the difficulty of raising children, a series of encounters, made the originally fragile family shaky, and everyone's life fell into a dilemma. So, who should be held responsible for this tragedy? The film does not give a clear answer, but throws out the question for the audience to think about.

At the end of the story, Wei Li, who was initially indifferent to everything around him, chose to stand on the side of the delivery man. He rejected the job offer from the company in order to protect himself, saying: "People are not oranges. You can't just eat the orange and throw away the peel."

Before the film was released, director Liu Taifeng accepted an exclusive interview with China Business Network, talking about the original intention of the creation and his thoughts beyond the creation. In his opinion, the film is not just about the story of platform workers or food deliverymen, it is about everyone living in the city, regardless of their social class or job, when each independent individual encounters difficulties or sees injustice, how to choose and connect.

"Another Day Full of Hope" tells a dramatic story, but the way it is presented is close to life itself. Many shots in the film restore the reality that everyone is experiencing every day: the noise of renovation, the busy traffic, the noisy streets, and the dusty construction sites.

Director Liu Taifeng is 40 years old this year. The story originated from an experience he had three years ago when he was waiting for a traffic light while driving to work. At a busy intersection, he waited for a long time for the red light: "The moment the red light turned green, I stepped on the accelerator, and a takeaway boy rushed past the front of the car, and I almost hit him." Liu Taifeng remembers the feeling at that moment. The heat wave on the hood made everything in front of him blurry, like a mirage, and the flow of people coming and going was constantly busy: "Suddenly I felt that everyone was so tired, what were they busy with?"

At that time, the film and television industry was in a period of stagnation, and Liu Taifeng spent a lot of time on scriptwriting. Before writing this story, he had been paying attention to news events in the fields of people's livelihood and society. He read the report "Food Delivery Riders, Trapped in the System" that caused a sensation on social platforms many times.

Liu Taifeng is increasingly aware that with the development of the Internet platform, life has become very different from the past. The Internet provides convenience and benefits to people, but it also brings unpredictable problems. Liu Taifeng believes that it is necessary to face up to the difficulties that are happening or about to happen: "First, we must acknowledge the existence of the problem. We can't keep saying that you can succeed if you work hard, it's not practical. We have to admit that we have encountered difficulties, so that we can reflect and change."

The story outline was written quickly, and after that, Liu Taifeng did a lot of research, talking with people from many industries such as food delivery workers, online car-hailing drivers, traffic police, lawyers, etc., to enrich the details of the script. During the conversation, he learned about the real situation of many food delivery workers: "Some of them are from rural areas, some are changing careers, and some are part-time workers. They all have different life experiences, but they are all truly crushed by life to the point of having to engage in this profession. This profession is not something you can experience for two days to feel the complexity and hardship of."

In the video, at the moment when the delivery man was knocked to the ground and bleeding, his phone kept beeping: "Your order is about to time out."

"The algorithm is cold and inhumane, and it speaks only to data. The platform tells the deliverymen not to run red lights and to follow the prescribed routes to avoid traffic accidents, but it ignores human nature. Every deliveryman wants to earn more in a limited time if possible." Liu Taifeng said that the algorithm also has loopholes: "When these loopholes come from the virtual world to the real world, they will spread to each of us like a butterfly effect, and the final outcome may be irreversible."

Liu Taifeng also learned that food delivery riders sign a cooperation agreement when they join the industry, but most of them do not read the agreement carefully, including the three yuan accident insurance that must be deducted for every day they go online. However, when a traffic accident occurs, the food delivery riders will not choose to report the insurance unless it is absolutely necessary: ​​"They told me that if I report the insurance, my account may be blocked. I don't understand, but it is the fact."

Speaks out the voice of the deliveryman

In early August, Another Day Full of Hope held a road show at Shanghai MOViE MOViE Cinema. Poet Wang Jibing rushed to the screening from Kunshan, Suzhou. Wang Jibing usually works part-time as a delivery man in Kunshan. He has been running around in the high temperature of nearly 40 degrees for days. Like many delivery men, his arms have been tanned.

There is a scene in the film where Xu Xiaoxia, the wife of the delivery man who was hit, points to the heavy traffic on the street and questions Wei Li: "Did all these delivery men run red lights? Why did they run red lights? Did my husband seek death?"

At that moment, Wang Jibing had an urge to stand up and resonate with her, and talk to everyone about why the deliverymen ran red lights. Previously, Wang Jibing had interviewed more than 100 deliverymen for writing, one of whom had a car accident on a rainy day and broke eight ribs. In his opinion, the plot setting of the movie is very real and speaks out the voices of many deliverymen, such as the platform's continuous compression of the deliverymen's delivery time: "When the time on the mobile phone starts to count down, people's psychology will change, and they may even do anything."

Wang Jibing told China Business News that he has also been studying how to solve the problems between food deliverymen and the platform in the past two years: "When I first started delivering food, the normal delivery time was about 50 minutes. Now the delivery time has been shortened to half an hour, but if the delivery time is extended, it still cannot solve the problem, because the ultimate goal of every food deliveryman doing this job is to make money. He will choose the way that can make the most money, which means running red lights, driving against the flow and other bad habits."

"Delivery boys are a team that needs to improve in life," said Wang Jibing. "Because delivery boys are a basic job for migrant workers, there is no training or requirements for you, and you can start working directly. But the issue of rights, as shown in the film, is really a difficult problem to solve, and it is not something that ordinary people can achieve with their wisdom."

Wang Jibing believes that it is important that more and more people are paying attention to this group: "Many problems may be unsolvable now and need time to resolve. Fortunately, it has received more and more attention. I believe that the future will be better and better, just like the title of the movie."

At the roadshow, producer Zhu Tong revealed a story behind the film. Song Ningfeng, who plays Wei Li, had his mother die in a traffic accident. One of the perpetrators was a 19-year-old delivery man. Song Ningfeng chose to forgive the accident and did not pursue the responsibility of the perpetrator: "He felt that there were many reasons why the delivery man was speeding at the time. He had poor vision, was in a hurry to deliver the food, and someone was urging him to take the order. A series of reasons led to the tragedy."

Who is creating value?

In this car accident that caused the misfortunes of two families, Liu Taifeng wanted to talk about more than just the living conditions of the delivery workers. For example, the social security issues of workers, and people's conscience and choices in a complex environment. This is not an emotional film full of accusations, but rather it is calm and restrained.

In the traffic accident in the film, the traffic police determined that the delivery driver was primarily responsible for driving against traffic and running a red light, and Wei Li was secondarily responsible for not slowing down when passing the intersection. Wei Li was dissatisfied and decided to appeal. During the discussion between the two parties on compensation, lawyer Feng Yuan and Wei Li had a dispute. Feng Yuan decided to sue the delivery company for its unreasonable reward and punishment system.

As part of the algorithm, Wei Li believes that the software created by the company brings convenience to people's lives, creates a new lifestyle, and creates value for society. Feng Yuan retorted: "The people who really create value are now lying in the ICU."

Chen Jinpeng's wife Xu Xiaoxia is also a migrant worker. For more than a decade, she has been doing cooking and teaching for many families in the city, and taking care of children. The couple does not have a city hukou, and their children have excellent grades, but they can only return to their hometown to continue their studies. After her husband was seriously injured, in order to apply for compensation, Xu Xiaoxia needed to prove her work experience in various ways. She felt puzzled: "I have been in this city for so many years. If I don't work, where would I get the money to live until now? Now I have to find a way to prove this."

The first meeting between lawyer Feng Yuan and Xu Xiaoxia was filmed in a tertiary hospital in Hangzhou. In the film, Feng Yuan saw Xu Xiaoxia, who was desperate, in the hospital corridor and offered her a helping hand. This scene was inspired by real life.

One month before the official filming, Liu Taifeng saw a woman sitting on the floor in the hospital corridor. On the day of filming, she was still sitting in the same position and wearing the same clothes. Liu Taifeng, Sun Zhihong, who played Feng Yuan, and Guo Keyu, who played Xu Xiaoxia, approached her to ask about the situation. The moment the woman looked up at them, she burst into tears.

They learned that the woman's husband had a cerebral hemorrhage at work a month ago and was admitted to the ICU. Both of them were migrant workers from other places who came to Hangzhou. Because their home was far from the hospital, she sat here every day to be closer to her husband. During that period of cautious travel, the woman told them many stories about the couple. They had a good relationship. The husband did manual labor, and she prepared fruits and boxed lunches for him every day.

The woman's words made Liu Taifeng feel warm and sad: "This is the common people, this is real life. They are no different from us, they work hard and sweat in exchange for rewards, but where is the guarantee? Food delivery riders also work hard to earn their value, why do they have to work so hard and take high risks? They want to get economic benefits proportional to their efforts. Is that wrong? I think it's very unfair."

After the film was finished, Liu Taifeng did not stop contacting the delivery riders. He learned that the current situation is that the unit price of the riders has been reduced again and again: "It has been squeezed to the limit, it's just a roll. The situation was better two years ago. At that time, everyone had difficulty traveling and needed delivery guys. Now they seem to be marginalized." A few days ago, during the hot summer, a sweaty rider told him that the high temperature subsidy was ten yuan. Liu Taifeng felt helpless: "40 degrees, ten yuan a day subsidy, what can I do?" When the film was on the roadshow in Jinan, a female rider who had been delivering food for seven years said that most delivery riders accidentally fell or bumped, and the first thing they thought about was not where they were injured, but whether the food was spilled.

At the end of the film, Wei Li chose to stand on the side of the delivery man and rejected the company's invitation. After leaving the company, he took a bus home with the words "Another day full of hope" written on it. The public service advertisement on the platform read: Care for society, care for the earth, care for the world, and care for nature. In Liu Taifeng's view, mutual understanding and kindness between people are very important at this moment.

The film has a subtitle that says "Xu Xiaoxia received compensation with the help of lawyer Feng." This is Liu Taifeng's wish: "They didn't get compensation in the movie, but I hope that countless people like Xu Xiaoxia and Chen Jinpeng can get compensation. Maybe in the future a series of legal policies will be established to promote the improvement of workers' protection. The change of the whole society requires the efforts of all of us."