To appreciate the movie, one needs to know the commercial environment of China in the late 1980's. After decades of rigid communist planned economy, market reform was introduced to China in 1980's. However, many mistakenly believed that capitalism was cheating, as the hard line communist propaganda claimed, and there were huge waves of economic crimes such as substituting fake and poor quality products for good products to cheat consumers and make a quick buck. This movie is the criticism of such decadence.