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Kiki & Tiger review
:. Director: Alain Gsponer
:. Starring: Lenn Kudrjawizki, Stipe Erceg
:. Running Time: 1:12
:. Year: 2002
:. Country: Germany
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Set in Germany, Kiki & Tiger follows the friendship between a Serbian and an Albanian in the late 1990's as violence in Kosovo reaches a boiling point.
Kiki (Stipe Erceg), an Albanian refugee and Tiger (Lenn Kudrjawizki), a Serbian immigrant, are joined at the hip. They spend their days working and goofing around at a factory and their nights at a techno club to the obvious consternation of those around them.
To Kiki's relatives, Tiger is a "Serbian pig", while to Tiger's particularly nationalistic father and friends, Kiki is an Albanian, synonymous with the untrustworthy enemy. Kiki is the confident, handsome one while Tiger is dependent, sexually confused and jealous when a girl enters the picture and takes Kiki away from him. The homo-erotic undertones in the relationship are alluded to but never fully realized. And in two cultures where masculinity is particularly virulent, obvious complications exist.
Gsponer provides insight into the life of immigrants and refugees in Western Europe. They live under the threat of constant raids and risk a lot to get into Germany, only to be unable to find work or work very cheaply. And assimilation means leaving some things behind for a culture that may never accept you.
Tiger's father is an interesting character. A devout Serbian nationalist who tries to ram ethnic hatreds down his son's throat, he has a son who barely speak Serbian. As Serb radio constantly plays in the background, he tries to settle his son's scores the old way, with a drink and a handshake. To destroy Tiger's friendship with Kiki, he makes accusations that plant confusion in his mind. On the one hand, his ways will have to change in another country. On the other, it's hard not to sympathize with someone who watches his culture slowly ebb away from his son's life.
Unfortunately, the film falters. The opening sequence is more like an Eastern European Laverne and Shirley, with Kiki and Tiger fooling around at the plant. The scene that should cement their relationship seems to mock it, make it too lighthearted. Also, the endless scenes in the nightclub don't add enough to their relationship and seem superfluous at times. It would have been interesting to know how these two came to be friends. With films like Broken English, dealing with ethnic hatreds in New Zealand and No Man's Land, which tackled an unlikely relationship in Bosnia, the addition of a film about Albanians and Serbians is a welcome one. And Gsponer certainly takes a huge risk in adding a homoerotic tension—this is something that hasn't really been seen before in films about that area.
The theme of acculturation as the loss of cultural identity intertwines with the search for sexual identity with war lurking in the background should make for a powder keg of a story. Though the premise is fascinating for a debut film, more character development is needed for it to be fully realized.
Anji Milanovic
 Movie Reviews: European Films
Movie Reviews since 2012
Reviews since 2012
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