No glamor, much grief in agonizing role for Pfeiffer
Gosh, but it’s good to have Michelle Pfeiffer back. It’s especially good to see this much of her, laid emotionally bare in a leading role with enough heft to anchor a drama as unrelentingly despairing as “Where Is Kyra?” Pfeiffer is cast powerfully against type, divested of her trademark glamor and shine to play a woman who, when she finds herself at the end of her rope, stops trying to climb and fashions a noose.
Kyra has hit a rough patch in a phase of life where she should be enjoying stability. Instead of approaching her own impending golden years in a warm home with a sizable nest egg, she finds herself absent her husband ( now divorced) and full- time job ( two years laid off ), living with her infirm and elderly mother. The two scrape by on paltry pension checks, which are a trial for the old woman to cash on hobbling excursions to the bank.
They’re such a trial that it’s no shock when, after one such arduous trip, she quietly dies in the apartment, leaving Kyra to navigate the wreckage of her life solo — and without the pension checks that were sustaining her
friendship struck up with Doug ( Kiefer Sutherland), a considerate and lonely neighbor, starts to turn into something more after a few commiserating drinks at the bar. He has his own checkered past, but one he’s seemingly surmounted through sheer will and a desire to do good. Their connection could offer Kyra an escape hatch, or at least a relief valve, if desperation weren’t already driving her to extremes from which she might not be able to recover.
“Where Is Kyra?” is ratcheting agony to watch. You almost have to peek through your fingers when Kyra tries to cash a check, buys a rum and Coke on her credit card and overturns her purse for spare change at the register. And that’s only the first phase of impoverishment, before the phone line is cut and the heat turned off. A horror- movie dread sets in. The monster here hasn’t got fangs or razor- sharp claws, but a collection notice.
Pfeiffer may be stripped of her luminosity, but she is vivid onscreen. The camera lingers on her, often in intimate close- ups. Complicated, emotionally wrought conversations play out with only her drawn face in the frame, leaving us to imagine the other person’s reactions based solely on her subtle changes in expression. It’s a heavy load, and one that she bears with grace.
Director Andrew Dosunmu is enamored of his photographer’s eye. He’s not shy to let a shot linger if it looks good, even past a scene’s dramatic efficacy. Often, that comes at a price, with compositions that are more captivating than characters. “Where Is Kyra?” is just as technically confident, if narratively less successful, than Dosunmu’s wellregarded 2013 film “Mother of George.” In his follow- up he’s gone even more interior and minimalist. One admires the daring even if the result feels slight.
Except when Pfeiffer’s performance is the focus. Nothing feels slight about that.