19/03/2024 - Hungarian directors Bálint Révész and Dávid Mikulán’s often overwhelming documentary tells of the 12-year odyssey of a boy from the fringes of Hungarian society

KIX first kicks you in the head with its dizzying opening, then it dominantly spars with you for a while until it slows down and starts working on your gut, eventually clenching your heart. The new documentary by Hungarian director Bálint Révész and video artist and filmmaker Dávid Mikulán tells of the 12-year odyssey of a boy from the fringes of Hungarian society, and it has world-premiered in CPH:DOX’s NEXT:WAVE Competition.

KIX could also be understood as having a connection to “just doing it for the kicks”, or it could be associated with FAX – meaning “dicks” in Hungarian – which the film’s protagonist, Sanyi, who is eight when the picture begins (as Orbán has just become prime minister), loves writing on every available surface in Budapest. “I am tough, and I’ll do what I want,” he says off camera, in the grizzled voice of his kind of alter-ego, a super-hobo, if you will, sounding like Batman in The Lego Movie.

Our hero and his slightly older brother Viktor are skateboarding when Mikulán, who is 21 at the time, approaches them with his own, much better board. Their common interest allows them to trust him, but they still call him a faggot.

Mikulán shoots the first, vertiginous segments of the film with camera in hand, often from the skateboard, as Sanyi and Viktor wreak havoc around the city: breaking a glass door propped up against the wall, kicking a football repeatedly at the iron church door, destroying a homeless person’s bed, gleefully adding to the mess in a dark, dilapidated squat, all to the super-fast, percussion-heavy score by Csaba Kalotás.

Then we meet the family: they live with their father, mother and grandmother in a 30-square-metre apartment, often sleeping in the same bed. Mother is working three jobs, and she still gets to “help” Sanyi with his homework by simply doing it for him, after slapping him on the back of the head. Father is largely absent in the first half of the film, but the frequent visits from the Child Protection Services are enough for the viewer to grasp the relations inside the family.

After Sanyi dives into a dirty canal in a slow-motion fade-out, the film shifts to a more traditional mode, with more disciplined camera work and longer cuts, observing from a greater distance. The boy is now 15, there is a new sister, the adorable, chubby Timi, and Viktor is replaced with two of Sanyi’s new friends with whom he regularly gets drunk and keeps causing trouble. Now he has a girlfriend and a makeshift gym in the basement, and is still talking and acting tough. But the consequences of the actions of a kid are different to those of a teenager, and they turn into something that threatens to completely upend his life.

KIX is one hell of a movie: an emotional and cinematic rollercoaster, an ode to childhood that turns into a sobering account of wild teenage years gone wrong. Plenty of humour and the generally upbeat dynamics of Ivan Zelić’s editing allow us to faithfully follow the hero’s journey and personality, but actually increase the sinking feeling the viewer gets when they catch their breath and think about what they’re seeing. Hungary’s political and social regression is in the background, more evident in the protagonists’ views and actions than in snippets from the TV or radio. It is a complex, often overwhelming film that doesn’t offer any answers or messages, instead immersing us in one life that has only just begun and is already heading towards a potentially tragic denouement.

KIX is a co-production between Hungary’s Elf Pictures, France's Cinéphage, Croatia’s Eclectica, Arte France and HBO Max.