Sibling Riflery

It's Christmas today, of course, and a critical component is family togetherness. I'm always very fortunate to be with my family at this time of year, and so today is a happy day. I suspect Christmas is also a good time for Ray and Kiki Tango, two of the prominent characters in "Tango & Cash". Yes, I am continuing on with my series of posts on that film, and I'll take the faintest of excuses to do it. The tenuous connection that family offers is enough.

It's a curious relationship that Ray Tango has with Kiki. In their first scene together, she is itching to get away from LA. Ray, in a paternal way, is striving to keep her close. We know she's a dancer, I believe, but are meant to assume they are romantically involved or something. In retrospect, her playful returns of Ray's straight lines suggest a sibling dynamic. Save for the overbearing quality, it's banter that many siblings might like to have with each other.

Further down the line, we find in fact that they are siblings, and that she lives in a house that he owns. Indeed, she pays him rent. She had expressed plans to leave town, and I have to assume that she never did. Ray was in jail, but seemingly for a day or so. It was far short of the time frame communicated. The fact that Ray owns the house and that one of the two titular cops' superior officers appears at the house convinces me that the house is in fact in LA.

In any case, Ray's overbearing status in the relationship continues, as the tension between him and Gabe Cash goes from their professional rivalry to their respective feelings about Kiki: Gabe wants to date her, and Ray refuses permission (though he has no right to do so). Perhaps it is a triumvirate all too common in real life, or maybe it's not. In any case, the sibling thing is a nice aspect of the movie that not so many action films feature, and so I approve.