FILM
Alki Alki

in cooperation with Indo Cine Appreciation Foundation

Fri, 21.09.2018
Goethe-Institut / Max Mueller Bhavan Auditorium

Alki, Alki" (the German slang for an alcoholic) is the tragicomic story of Tobias and Flasche (which also happens to be the German word for bottle), two friends for life and classic cases of arrested development, partying, boozing and self-destructing like a couple of idiotic teenagers. They have stuck together, through thick and thin, ever since their youth, with not even a day spent apart.

This would be fine in its way, except Tobias is now in the flower of life, in his mid-40s, with a wife and children. He also has his own business. Nonetheless, he is yet to grow up. Together with Flasche he rocks the night away in discos and raves, partying with people young enough to be his own children. The nights are spent drinking himself into oblivion, the days are spent in bed, nursing the mother of all hangovers. Rinse and repeat on a daily basis. There is, sooner or later, a price to be paid, one that is mounting steadily and the due date is getting ever closer.

Tobias gets caught up increasingly in arguments with his wife Anika, his children and business partner Thomas, with whom he has founded an architect's office. He then loses his driving license, the clients are deserting the sinking ship of a business, his love-life with his wife hits the rocks and his children don't want to know him any longer, and he them. Things finally reach a crisis point when he causes a car crash that almost kills his kids.

Gradually, realization draws and Tobias knows his friendship with Flasche is no longer good for him: it is time for them to separate and go their own ways. But it is already much too late for that. Tobias is unable to drop "the bottle", as it were. The self-destructively murderous spiral continues to turn until things get really gnarly.