Over the last two years, motherhood and its associated hardships have dominated critically acclaimed films. Whether we watched Amy Adams convince herself she was turning into a dog in Nightbitch (2024) or Jennifer Lawrence suffering through postpartum in Die My Love (2025), female filmmakers were letting us know that having a child is a nightmare unlike any other. Imagine my surprise when I saw that documentarian Alexe Poukine was making her narrative debut with a film about — you guessed it — a pregnant mother struggling to make ends meet after a tragedy befalls her. Well, I’m elated to report that Kika (2025), which had its New York Premiere at the New Directors/New Films festival this past weekend, blows its mother-centric predecessors out of the water with a star-turning performance by Manon Clavel in the titular role.
Poukine introduces us to Kika in the thick of her job as a social worker in Brussels, Belgium. Case after case, she exhausts herself by failing to separate her work from her personal life because the city does not provide enough funding for social services through her non-profit. At home, she has a daughter with her run-of-the-mill husband, who often tries to engage her with sweet nothings to no avail. On her way home after an especially stressful day, she stops at a bike repair shop to fix her daughter’s bike, but accidentally locks herself inside the store with the handsome mechanic as she shuts the door behind her. They eventually break free from the shop, but the chemistry between them lingers like a storm cloud over Kika.
Jumping forward a few months, Kika’s life pretty much looks the same — except that the bikeshop mechanic, David (Makita Samba), is now her boyfriend. Poukine wastes no time in wallowing in divorce fallout or how Kika’s daughter adapts to this new normal, which is a fresh spin on an affair’s collateral damage. However, this bliss quickly dissipates once Kika receives a phone call that David has died from a stroke, leaving her and her daughter with no home, no money, and no love besides each other moving forward.
Kika is a difficult film to define in terms of tone, as the comedic moments certainly outweigh the tragedies Kika faces. As a result, the film never bogs you down with the socioeconomic realities affecting Kika, but rather finds the absurdity in what we find ourselves doing to put food on the table. For Kika, those means involve selling her used underwear to men over the internet and eventually coming into her own as a dominatrix. Her road to sex work is filled with hilarious vignettes surrounding pearl-clutching kinks and personal hesitations, yet Poukine refuses to exploit this occupation for shock value, opting to elucidate the genuine longing for company that torments Kika’s clients. She walks this tightrope act like no director I’ve seen before, and she always ensures that each scene’s emotional weight is not cheapened by the taboo BDSM acts at the center.
When Kika seeks advice from the career dominatrix Rasha (Anaël Snoek), she finally confronts her sorrow over leaving her husband and losing her boyfriend in such a short amount of time. Across the newer, incredibly intense clients that Rasha brings her way, Kika witnesses how trauma manifests itself in unexpected desires and debilitating insecurities.
During an unforgettable job, Kika and Rasha make a house visit to a wealthy gentleman in the outskirts of town that seems like the lottery to Kika; cut to the two women feeding the man as he sits in an adult-sized highchair, you cannot help but watch the scene unfold through cracks in your fingertips. Not only does Poukine force us to watch a grown man have his diaper changed by Kika and Rasha, but she also makes a point of zeroing in on Kika’s incredibly uncomfortable attitude towards this client. Whereas Rasha treats him like the baby he wants to be, Kika physically cannot bring herself to soothe him, considering that she carries so much guilt over her inability to comfort her own daughter. Here, Poutine bursts Kika’s playful bubble to offer a sobering reflection on how distractions in the pursuit of a better life only prolong our own turmoil.
Kika has had a yearlong journey since its world premiere at the Critics’ Week parallel section at Cannes last year, but its underdog status is only going to propel Poukine and Clavel into the international spotlight. With such an endearing protagonist and unconventional pacing, Kika easily goes up against any Hollywood crowdpleaser screening in theaters today. Additionally, Poutine challenges us not to judge Kika for her life choices, but instead to embrace this slice of life that very easily mimics the realities of other young mothers around the globe. We all want to save our loved ones from hardship, and Kika reminds us that we also need to save ourselves in the process.
Review Courtesy of Kyle Saavedra
Feature Image Credit to Totem Films