‘Flying Tigers’ | reFrame Initiatives Foundation

Flying Tigers is a film on memory, war and infrastructure.

Flying Tigers, an US army unit, initiated a monumental infrastructure project during WWII in Assam, India to send military aid across Himalayas to Kunming, China. The operation disturbed the forest life in Assam to such an extent that the tigers entered human settlements to steal food from the kitchens. This story resurfaced after 70 years, when mother of the director Madhusree got Alzheimer’s and repeatedly mentioned that the tigers are coming.

Madhusree meets Mi You, a Chinese media scholar, at a chance encounter in Germany and found that Mi’s family was living in Kunming during the war. The American operation turned out to be a shared family legacy between the Chinese scholar and the Indian filmmaker. But the connection could be discovered only in another continent, away from home. Sometimes dislocations are essential to find one’s self in the appropriate context. Mi You and Madhusree embark on a journey to trace back their lineage in the fragmented and, also often contested world histories. On the way they meet Purav, a writer living in Assam, whose research interest maps the territorial history through spoken words and materiality.

Three of them spin three distinct narratives around the Flying Tigers operation from their own positions.  As the protagonists speculate on a distant past, their own lives—its compulsions, fragilities and hybridities—seep in.

The film is shot in India, China, Germany and Poland. It is a tapestry of testimonies, travelogues, performances, art installations, motion graphics and sonic composition.

Script and Direction: Madhusree Dutta

Protagonists: Madhusree Dutta, Mi You, Purav Goswami

Cinematography: Riju Das, Isabelle Casez, Guligo Jia

Sound Recording: Abhijit Chetiya, Junyi He, Pascal Capitolin

Sound Design: Boby John

Music: Bo Wiget, Chandril Bhattacharya, Monika Rinck, Upal Sengupta

Visual Design: Suresh B V, Nina Sabnani

Editing: Federico Neri

Research Support: Goethe Institute, Sher-Gil Sundaram Arts Foundation

Production Support: Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and Media (Germany), Medienbord Berlin-Brandenburg, Arte / ZDF

Producers: pong Films, Germany and TCG Studios, India; 2026