During the past 60 years, China made a huge revolution. Some noticeable changes were also depicted in Chinese films produced within this time. The focus of work change in Chinese Communist Party smoothly transforms the theme of films from socialism to capitalism, from community to individual, from altruism to egoism. To acquire better understanding of these improvements, drawing a comparison between the film It's My Day Off in 1950s and Ermo in 1990s is a good start. This examination will facilitate the process because both films focus on how individual roles have progressed in different developing stages in China.
Competition between different groups and parties is one of the highlights in the two films. If one steps back and views It's My Day Off politically and globally, the competition reveals itself. China was starting to catch up with some developing country during the first few five-year plans. As a result, Tianmin Ma's story shows Chinese strong enthusiasm and ambition of competing with other developing countries, even developed ones. However, in reality the unrealistic slogan turned out to be too good to be achieved. Therefore, China changes the strategy and gradually opens its door to the world. As the author Ping Fu noted, ".China's opening to the world economy has been a spectacular success"(Chinese Films in Focus II, 103). This success is vividly expressed through the later film Ermo. The scene of Ermo shouting out "selling twisted noodles ." louder than the other seller shows the competition within a business. And this is exactly what an active market should be. Only if China is full of competitions itself, can China truly compete with other nations.
Being responsible for different scale of groups is quite live from two films. Contributing to one's nation China was quite popular in 1950s because the first five-year plan was launched in 1953. The film It's My Day Off achieves high level of reflecting this period.