Racing Through the 1990S: A Brothers' Legend

Crazy 90: A Legendary Brotherhood of Passion Set in Tiexi District, a major heavy-industry hub in Northeast China during the 1990s, this story follows Chen Mo, a boy from the bottom rung of society, as he and his brothers Li Jianjun and Wang Lei carve out a life together amid the tides of the times. At seventeen, Chen Mo is a “troublemaker” at Tiexi Technical School. His family is struggling: his father has been laid off, and his mother runs a street stall. Discrimination and bullying expose him far too early to life’s harsh realities. Then he meets Li Jianjun, the son of a veteran, and Wang Lei, a country boy. The three teenagers, all pushed to society’s margins by fate, swear brotherhood with their fists. With the fire of youth, they stand up to school bullies and, in their innocence, protect one another’s dignity. When Lin Xiaoxue, the factory director’s daughter, stirs up their youthful longings, and threats from gang leader Zhang Hu shatter their peace, their lives veer sharply off course. From the corrugated rooftops of their technical school to the neon lights of video halls, from the steel jungles of unfinished buildings in Hainan to the crowds at Guangzhou Railway Station, the three brothers press on through the pain of state-owned enterprise reforms, the tide of the market economy, and the rumblings of a crackdown, caught between the underworld and the world of business. They once defended brotherhood with switchblades and gambled on tomorrow amid unfinished buildings. They became the era’s biggest players in the VCD boom, then fell and rose again in the internet wave. As flared jeans give way to suits, and street brawls become business negotiations, the graffiti scrawled on red-brick walls, the beer bottles stained with blood, and the vows made in bathhouses late at night still burn in their memories. This is a youth epic of the 1990s: a story of brotherhood, love, and struggle, and of how a group of boys forged their own world amid the ruins of steel mills and smokestacks.