Danis Tanović: Tigers in Brescia

Tigers (India, France, 2014, 94)

Director: Danis Tanović
Screenplay: Danis Tanović, Andy Paterson
Cinematography: Erol Zubčević
Editing: Prerna Saigal
Set design: K.K. Muralidharan, Rachna Rastogi
Costume design: Niharikha Bhasin Khan
Music: Pritam Chakraborty
Sound: Anthony B. J. Ruban
Cast: Emraan Hashmi (Ayan), Geetanjali Thapa (Zainab), Danny Huston (Alex), Khalid Abdalla (Nadeem), Satyadeep Misra (il dottor Faiz), Maryam d’Abo (Maggie), Adil Hussain (Bilal)
Producers: Marc Baschet, Čedomir Kolar, Kshitij Chaudhary, Prashita Chaudhary, Anurag Kashyap, Guneet Monga, Andy Paterson
Production: Cinemorphic Pvt Ltd, Sikhya Entertainment Pvt Ltd

Ayan, young and newly married, earns his living as a pharmaceutical representative with difficulty. Luck comes when he manages to get hired by the multinational Lasta, of which he quickly become the best seller. But when he discovers the side effects of the milk powder he is promoting, the shock is enormous. So, he decides, to declare war on the multinational, facing heavy consequences. Long after, a film crew would like to tell its story.

«The struggle of an ordinary man to stop a serious injustice is one of the seven great cinematographic themes in which Danis Tanović’s Tigers dives into with passionate indignation. The film is the true story of a humble Pakistan pharmaceutical representative who sacrificed everything to raise a protest against one of the most powerful multinationals in the world (it is clearly Nestlé, even if in the film is represented with the fictitious “Lasta”), whose powdered milk, mixed with impure water, caused the death of several children. We should return to The Constant Gardener’s accusations against Big Pharma’s illegal trials to find an equally compelling treatment of the subject. Although the charm of John Le Carré’s heartbreaking African story is lacking, the film’s direct approach, mixed with real images of seriously ill children, is effective in mobilizing public outrage. […] The film seems to be a second stage in the career of Bosnian director Tanović, whose debut feature, the black comedy No Man’s Land, won an Oscar. After bringing a real-life couple to the screen in An Episode in the Life of an Iron-Picker, Tanović and co-writer Andy Paterson in order to give impetus to the story, use the expedient of a director who intends to tell a story about the Ayan affair. This choice for once is effective, because in the end it all depends on the power and cowardice of the media.»

(Deborah Young, «The Hollywood Reporter», 7th September 2014)