Review: Where is Kyra?
There is undeniable beauty in every frame of director Andrew Dosunmu's third feature film, Where is Kyra?. Most are courtesy of Oscar-nominated cinematographer Bradford Young (Arrival), who unearths breathtaking majesty in penumbral light, sepulchral shadows, and bleak silhouettes. At the center of it all is Michelle Pfeiffer, one of cinema's great beauties, delivering a performance of devastating power and melancholy. If you've forgotten what a tremendous talent Pfeiffer is, Where is Kyra? is here to remind you in no uncertain terms of her prowess.
One of the many remarkable things with the film is how it subverts the usual star vehicle. This is not a film in which every scene serves the star, but rather in which the star serves every scene or, more specifically, the mise-en-scène. When not forcing her in the fringes or framing her from a distance, the camera is unrelentingly and unmercifully trained on her face and Pfeiffer, the modern-day Garbo, conveys multitudes with the most minute movement. Even in these close-ups, the first of which is teasingly withheld, Pfeiffer's Kyra feels like she's about to materialise into nothing and with good reason. Kyra is, like the recurrent shot of an old woman with a cane slowly walking on the street, a woman invisible to a society trained to overlook women once they are past a certain age.
Divorced, unemployed for the past two years, she spends most of her time caring for her ailing mother (Suzanne Shepherd), who only ever seems to go outside in order to cash her disability checks. When her mother finally passes, Kyra is beset by desperation as she pounds the pavement in search of a job, any job, to keep her afloat. The bulk of the film is essentially watching and feeling the noose tighten around Kyra's neck as the heating goes, the phone is cut off, the threat of eviction looms, and the debts continue to pile up to such a degree that she forces herself into a corner from which there is no escape. Amidst the demoralising hopelessness, Kyra finds a modicum of happy relief with Doug (Kiefer Sutherland), a guy she meets at a bar who holds down several jobs and who has just gotten his life somewhat together.
With such endless gloom and doom, one would think that Where is Kyra? would be a miserable viewing experience. Yet the grimness never gets oppressive or off-putting; the film remains a compelling watch thanks to the outstanding visuals and Pfeiffer's haunting and heartbreaking portrayal of a woman with little to begin with and whose remaining options are dwindling by the second.
Where is Kyra?
Directed by: Andrew Dosunmu
Written by: Darci Picoult
Starring: Michelle Pfeiffer, Kiefer Sutherland, Suzanne Shepherd, Sam Robards
