TIGER STRIPES - Mark Reviews Movies

Tiger Stripes, Darl Star Pictures

Follow on Facebook | Follow on Twitter | Become a Patron

Review by Mark Dujsik | June 13, 2024

After becoming the first girl in her class to get her period, Zaffan (Zafreen Zairizal) slowly finds herself ostracized from her peers and even her closest friends. Tiger Stripes transplants the perspective of those kids, as well as adults who see Zaffan as a problem for other reasons, upon this girl, gradually transforming her into a literal monster.

The conceit of writer/director Amanda Nell Eu's feature debut is intriguing, but the execution of this movie never quite makes its central metaphor make much sense. It's easy enough to understand what the filmmaker is trying to say—pointing the finger at a society that undermines and demeans girls and women for who they are.

Natural changes and minor acts of rebellion look monstrous under such a system. If everyone's going to call poor Zaffan a freak and akin to a demon for starting puberty and wanting a little bit of freedom, why shouldn't she just embrace that notion?

The story, set in a rural village in Malaysia, becomes a confused, half-hearted, and unconvincing mix of the day-to-day and horror, though. They don't complement each other here, since the more grounded side of this story, following Zaffan at school and occasionally observing her troubled home life, only seems to serve the mounting horror elements. We have no sense of who this girl is apart from her existence as a metaphor, and once that angle fully takes over the story, the movie only portrays her as a monster.

The little we do get to see of Zaffan before her body starts changing, both naturally and allegorically, isn't much. She and her best friends, the stern Farah (Deena Ezral) and the quiet Mariam (Piqa), go to classes and spend their after-school hours playing in the surrounding jungle. Zaffan likes to take off her school uniform, including a hijab and long dress that covers her arms, and have Mariam record her dancing for social media. Farah disapproves, of course, as does Zaffan's mother (played by June Lojong), who drags her daughter outside to shame the girl for daring to walk around without her body being fully covered.

Then, Zaffan gets her period. Farah is appalled, distances herself, and starts spreading rumors about her former friend. Soon enough, Zaffan's body starts changing in other, less-natural ways—namely growing whiskers, fingernails falling off and being replaced by claws, her feet becoming more like paws, and an instinct to hunt living animals. She's basically becoming a human-tiger hybrid.

From there, the movie becomes exclusively about that, as Zaffan's "curse" starts to spread to other girls, the school administration tries to figure out what's happening, and Zaffan's parents eventually call upon the help of a questionable doctor. Any other sense of Zaffan becomes lost in this allegory, which keeps hitting the same note over and over. Tiger Stripes is certainly bold in the social critique of its premise, but the storytelling isn't nearly as confident.

Back to Home

Buy Related Products