• Producer(s):

    ARTE G.E.I.E, YEMAYA PRODUCTIONS

  • Territories:

    Worldwide.

  • Production year:

    2017

  • Language(s):

    German, French

  • Rights:

    TV, NON-THEATRICAL, INTERNET

More than one million Chinese live underground in the capital, making up what the Chinese media calls the “Rat Tribe”.

In Beijing, wages are low, but rents have kept pace with the frenetic economic growth China has seen in recent years. This makes it impossible for many Chinese, especially those who have moved from the countryside, to find anywhere to live above ground. One common solution is the air-raid shelters built in the 1960-70s, when tensions between China and the former USSR were at their height.
A city within the city, this subterranean space is rented in peacetime by the state to private agencies who over the years have becomes the merchants of a dormitory world.
Now, after decades of laisser-faire, the authorities want to tackle Beijing’s over-population problem through evictions and the closure of the shelters. But despite the official discourse, the underground phenomenon is not likely to disappear so soon.