Johnny Keep Walking!

年会不能停！

China, 2023, colour, 2.35:1, 115 mins.

Director: Dong Runnian 董润年.

Rating: 7/10.

Sharp satire on corporate bureaucracy and office politics, as a nobody rises through the ranks, has fine performances but is let down by a discursive second half.

STORY

Datan city, somewhere in China, Sep 2019. Hu Jianlin (Da Peng), 40, is a fitter who has worked diligently at Zhonghe Standard Parts Factory all his life, as the company has grown, along with the country, into the giant Datan Zhonghe Group, now headquartered in the provincial capital. A popular figure, he’s become identified with the traditional New Year get-togethers of staff and mangement ever since he sang at one, in 1998, hanging from the ceiling. Hu Jianlin has never been ambitious, and his wife (and former co-worker) (E Jingwen) had walked out on him in 2017, after 18 years of marriage, because of it. Now, after 20 years with the company, he suddenly receives a letter telling him to report immediately to the head office. Surprised – but seeing it as a recognition of his long-term diligence and loyalty as a worker – he takes the train to the provincial capital. His colleagues are equally surprised but also delighted for him. The one exception is Zhuang Zhengzhi (Wang Xun), head of distribution, who’s spent RMB300,000 in bribes – via black-marketeer middleman Hou Chengshi [Yang Lei] to executive vice-chairman Xu Yunfeng, aka Jeffery [Li Naiwen], at head office – to get himself transferred. Meanwhile, head office is planning to axe 40% of the workforce – 6,000 people – to deal with a cashflow crisis. Codenamed Project Guangjin 裁员广进计划, it’s the brainchild of slippery HR head Zhao Feiyu, aka Thomas (Da Mu), and everyone in the company is nervous. Thomas’ deputy, Peter (Sun Yizhou), is put in charge of dealing with Hu Jianlin, and he delegates responsibility to Ma Jie, aka Magic (Bai Ke), assistant head of the department for staff affairs and company culture, as well as assistant head of Team 3, who always does exactly as he is ordered for fear of losing his job. Magic shows Hu Jianlin the ropes, tells a gobsmacked Hu Jianlin that his salary grade is now K7 (about RMB400,000 a year), and shows him a luxury company flat he can stay in free for his first three months. Hu Jianlin has been given the job title of “specialist” 专员, though no one seems to know what he is meant to be a specialist in. When Hu Jianlin asks Peter why he’s been promoted to head office, Peter just asks him to guess. Next day, Magic tells Peter he’s just realised that, amid all the bureaucracy, Hu Jianlin’s file became mixed up with Zhuang Zhengzhi’s, and if Thomas hears about it both he and Peter are dead meat. It turns out that Thomas, who was part of the original bribery chain, has already forgotten about it all, so Peter tells Magic to make sure that Hu Jianlin sits at his desk in the giant HR centre and does nothing that could compromise anybody. Realising he needs some help, Magic arranges for contract worker Pan Yiran, aka Penny (Zhuang Dafei) – a university graduate who’s fed up that Zhonghe still hasn’t put her on staff – to be transferred to his Team 3. Meanwhile, Magic gives Hu Jianlin the time-wasting job of memorising the name and details of every member of staff. This spreads more paranoia among employees as he diligently walks around the building smiling at everyone. Because no one knows why Hu Jianlin has been transferred at a time of swingeing staff cuts, it is assumed he is backed by someone high up in the company. Hu Jianlin ends up being promoted to head of Team 3 – above Magic – and to salary grade K8. But then one day Zhuang Zhengzhi, frustrated by the lack of news about his promotion, turns up at head office demanding to speak to Thomas.

REVIEW

A pointed satire on corporate bureaucracy and office politics that would have been even sharper with 15 minutes taken out of the second half, Johnny Keep Walking! 年会不能停！ is largely sustained by its fine cast, especially comedian Da Peng 大鹏 as the humble fitter who keeps getting promoted for no reason and Bai Ke 白客 as the bureaucratic toadie who shelters him. Released in the final days of Dec 2023, this second feature by Tianjin-born writer-turned-director Dong Runnian 董润年, following his impressive feature debut (but box-office dud) Gone with the Light 被光抓走的人 (2019), immediately put 40-something Dong in the big time with a hunky hawl of RMB1.29 billion. (He’s since directed the 24-part online youth drama Later, I Laughed 不讨好的勇气, streamed in late 2024, starring Li Gengxi 李庚希, Wei Daxun 魏大勋 and Wang Hao 王皓, see left).

Da Peng, aka Dong Chengpeng 董成鹏, has made a whole career out of playing likeable or pompous idiots, and here he’s perfectly cast as Hu Jianlin, a humble fitter at Zhonghe spare-parts factory who has no ambition in life except to do his job and sing at the factory’s year-end party at which management and staff get together. The film starts in 1998, when he accidentally starts singing at that year’s party, and then fast-forwards through the country’s rapid modernisation and development, during which time Zhonghe becomes a mega-group with a head office away in the provincial capital but Hu Jianlin still happily works away in the same job. Then suddenly, in 2019, he gets a letter promoting him – to the surprise of everyone, including himself – to the head office, with the vague title of “specialist” 专员. Typically, he thinks it is simply in recognition of his loyalty and the factory as a whole.

Head office turns out to be a hive of entrenched, inter-fighting bureaucrats and massive over-staffing, through which Hu Jianlin, with his permanent idiotic smile, floats in complete ignorance. No one in HR quite knows why he’s been transferred to head office with a wacking salary rise, but the responsibility of looking after him is delegated down the line and ends up in the hands of craven young bureaucrat Ma Jie, aka Magic. (All executives in head office are assigned English names to make the company international-friendly). Magic soon realises the truth – that Hu Jianlin’s file has somehow been muddled up with that of a more senior person at his factory who’d bribed various people at head office to get transferred. But with everyone looking over their shoulders as a massive programme of staff cuts goes through, no one dares blow the whistle. So Hu Jianlin just keeps getting promoted.

The rise and rise of a nobody through the corporate ranks is a new theme for Mainland cinema but has been a common one in western movies since the 1950s – though in those the central character generally rises by manipulating the system rather than surrendering to it (Nothing but the Best, 1964; How to Succeed in Business without Really Trying, 1967; The Rise and Rise of Michael Rimmer, 1970; The Secret of My Success, 1987). The screenplay of Johnny (by Dong and his wife Ying Luojia 应萝佳, now his regular co-writer and producer) cleverly keeps its options open on Hu Jianlin’s complicity in his rise, as does Da Peng’s cleverly blank performance, all smiles and professed innocence. He’s beautifully complemented by the playing of Bai Ke, aka Luo Hongming 罗宏明 (Surprise 万万没想到, 2015; Nice to Meet You 遇见你真好, 2018; The Best Is Yet to Come 不止不休, 2020), a chameleon actor-comedian who here plays a bespectacled young paper-pusher who’ll accept any humiliation to keep his job.

The large, ensemble cast is packed with flavour, including Shenyang-born actress-singer Zhuang Dafei 庄达菲 – in her first major film role, and soon to bloom in time-travel comedy Be My Friend 我才不要和你做朋友呢 (2024) – as a cheesed-off contract worker, comic veteran Wang Xun 王迅 chewing the scenery as the corrupt executive whose file got mixed up wuth Hu Jianlin’s, Li Naiwen 李乃文 as a super-smooth, corrupt vice-chairman, and talk-show host Da Mu 大木 as the slippery HR head.

The main weakness of the film is that, after a terrific first hour showing Hu Jianlin’s rise and rise, things plateau as little new is added to the corporate satire and a whole subplot is developed of the passed-over executive getting his revenge. This has the effect of diverting the action away from Hu Jianlin’s character, who remains dramatically stranded in the second hour. The early, almost cartoonish tone (with people introduced by large on-screen characters) is also abandoned for a much more conventional corruption drama. The finale, set round that year’s lavish staff get-together, is way too prolonged, with Da Peng & Co. singing and dancing, and a general air of old-style workers’ solidarity being evoked, even during the end titles. (Zhuang even gets her own solo song.)

Technical credits, led by the unfussy widescreen photography of d.p. Chen Jun 陈军 (B for Busy 爱情神话, 2021; Give Me Five 哥，你好, 2022), are strong without being over-slick or getting in the way of the performances. The film is set in a fictional city but was actually shot in Changsha. The Chinese title literally means “The Annual Get-Togethers Can’t Be Stopped!”, referring to the more and more elaborate staff parties that Hu Jianlin has always starred in. The weird-sounding English title uses Hu Jianlin’s adopted English name (actually John, not Johnny) to even more senseless effect. The full codename for the company’s redundancy plan is a clever but untranslateable pun that plays on the words 裁员 (“cut staff”) and 财源 (“revenue source”), which are both identically pronounced (cáiyuán).

Dong has since co-written, with Luo, the recently wrapped WW2 action drama Dongji Island 东极岛, on which one of the directors is Guan Hu 管虎, for whom Dong wrote two of his earliest scripts (The Chef The Actor The Scoundrel 厨子戏子痞子, 2013; Mr. Six 老炮儿, 2015).

CREDITS

Presented by Beijing JQ Pictures (CN), China Youth New Power Pictures (Hainan) (CN), Huaxia Film Distribution (CN), Tianjin Maoyan Weiying Cultural Media (CN), Xiaoxiang Film Group (CN), Shanghai Audacious Cultural Communication (CN), China Film (CN), Shanghai Taopiaopiao Movie & TV Culture (CN). Produced by Shanghai Audacious Cultural Communication (CN), Beijing JQ Pictures (CN), Hunan Dangran Film (CN).

Script: Dong Runnian, Ying Luojia. Script advice: Ji Yuanhui, Guo Douzhi. Photography: Chen Jun. Editing: Huang Zeng Hongchen. Editing advice: Zhang Yibo. Music: Huang Yixin. Art direction: Zhang Xiaobing. Costumes: Li Zheng. Styling: Lu Wenhua. Sound: Huang Zheng, Zhang Jian. Action: Han Ping. Car stunts: Gan Guoqiang. Visual effects: Shi Ye.

Cast: Da Peng [Dong Chengpeng] (Hu Jianlin), Bai Ke (Ma Jie/Magic, assistant head of department for staff affairs and company culture, team 3 assistant head), Zhuang Dafei (Pan Yiran/Penny), Wang Xun (Zhuang Zhengzhi, head of distribution), Sun Yizhou (Peter, deputy head of HR department), Li Naiwen (Xu Yunfeng/Jeffery, executive vice-chairman), Zhang Monan (Ma Ke/Mark), Da Mu (Zhao Feiyu/Thomas, head of HR department), Huang Huang (Jia Haohao/Tony, Thomas’ fat sidekick), Ouyang Fenqiang (Hu, chairman), Wang Hao (young Hu Jianlin), Kong Lianshun (head of subcontracted factory), Yi Yunhe (Xu Yongsen), E Jingwen (Cao Huilan, Hu Jianlin’s wife), Shi Laoban, Liu Shou (department heads), Zhao Tian’ai (Xiaosu), Wang Xuedong (Xiaojia), Li Dong (Xiaohuang), Song Muzi (department head), He Wenjun, Li Fei (his assistants), Li Ping (Hu Jianlin’s mother), Lu Gengxu (MC), Yang Lei (Hou Chengshi), Zhou Xiaochuan (Gao Ming/George, vice-chairman manufacturing).

Release: China, 29 Dec 2023.