The story is set in northern China in 1999 and 2004. A detective works to solve a series of murders where the victims' dismembered parts are scattered across the province via coal shipments. The common thread in the film is a female clerk in a dry cleaners. The project started from Diao Yinan's idea to film a detective story. He spent eight years in total writing the screenplay, the final version being the third draft. Diao wanted the film to be firmly based in the ‘noir’ genre. The film's English title Black Coal, Thin Ice is different from its Chinese title Bai Ri Yan Huo, which translates literally as "Daylight Fireworks". Diao clarified the meaning of "daylight fireworks" as a sentiment or a condition. For him, the Chinese and English names together helped to construct the difference between reality and fantasy. "Coal and ice both belong to the realm of reality, but fireworks in daylight is something fantastic; they are the two sides of the same coin."