The film is part of the trilogy ‘Urban attitudes’, that started with Stand Up, Don’t Grovel! (1993) (screened in Rotterdam in 1994) and was followed by Back to Back, Face to Face (1994). Part three, Signal Left, Turn Right, is more a collection of gags and situation sketches than a plot-driven film. It stresses the contradictions in modern Chinese life. The director Huang wants to show the true face of his country and people, and is most interested in everyday life and the themes he is familiar with. In Signal Left, Turn Right, Huang focuses on a group of mature students at a driving school and analyses the various reasons why they want to learn to drive. One of them (a role by the chubby Niu Zhenhua, the thread through the trilogy) is an incredibly clever photo journalist attracted to prestige. The driving school in question is situated in Xi’an and has a militaristic bent. It is usual here for the instructor to teach several pupils at once. Instructor Hou has to cope with a very varied group. As the comic situations pile up, the pupils become increasingly united, having started as stranger to each other. They start cooperating so they all have a better chance of passing. The day of the driving test arrives. David Stratton, Variety: ‘Huang consolidates his reputation as the leading satirist of Chinese cinema.’
