A key 5th Generation work released during the 2nd phase of Deng Xiaoping's social and also financial reforms, this durable social satire wonderfully depicts the clash in between the climbing course of quick industrial modernizers as well as old Party staffs with a major Cultural Change hangover. The movie narrates the Kafkaesque dilemma of a bumbling factory translator who is presumed of commercial espionage after sending out an innocent telegram that is intercepted by a militant snoop. (The "black cannon" of the title refers to the missing chess piece the unlucky hero is attempting to locate.) Placed under examination and reassigned to a much less sensitive division but never informed of the reason for his downgrading, he petitions to get his task back, stimulating a significantly obtuse as well as humorous series of Event conferences, set in a conference room straight out of German Expressionism.