‘Kathleen Is Here’: Raindance Review

Dir/scr: Eva Birthistle. Eire. 2023. 92 minutes

Actor Eva Birthistle makes a powerful begin to her function directing profession with this psychologically complicated and tense Irish drama targeted on a teen contemporary out of the care system. Increasing on her 2020 brief Kathleen Was Right here, which additionally starred charismatic up-and-comer Hazel Doupe (You Are Not My Mom) within the lead, the author/director affords a mix of uncooked realism and tough-love empathy that remembers the early work of Andrea Arnold. 

 Forthright concerning the points it’s tackling with out wallowing in them

Though the topic is gritty, Ae Fond Kiss and Unhealthy Sisters star Birthistle manages to take care of a thread of hopefulness amid the melancholy, which means Kathleen Is Right here feels forthright concerning the points it’s tackling with out wallowing in them. It is a character research somewhat than a neo-realist examination of the care system, and robust performances and a gripping slide in the direction of a story of obsession ought to be a magnet for distributors after its world premiere at Raindance.

The thought of a “contemporary begin” rings hole for 18-year-old Kathleen (Doupe, a Display Star Of Tomorrow in 2022) – whose life has been marked by a succession of them at varied foster houses – as she returns to the home she shared as a younger baby along with her now-dead alcoholic mum (Toni O’Rourke, glimpsed briefly in effectively included flashbacks and residential video), within the fictional rural Irish small city of Kilcarren. Her social employee Damian (Aaron Monaghan) tells her it’s “time to be a grown up”, however as we see Kathleen attempt to grapple with life on her personal, it begs the query of whether or not she has ever really had the possibility to be a baby.

The final look captured by cinematographer Burschi Wojnar, additionally getting back from Kathleen Was Right here, is cool and bleak. It’s not that the home Kathleen has moved into is terrible, it’s simply unremarkable and fundamental, the strip lights within the kitchen, yellowing web curtains and dripping faucet carrying echoes of the neglect Kathleen additionally skilled. Work stacking cabinets on the native grocery store brings a possible pal, the celeb-loving Yvonne (Liadan Dunlea), but it surely’s new neighbour Dee (Clare Dunne) who Kathleen instantly takes a shine to.

Dee, who has a pre-teen son Conor (James McGowan) with husband Rory (Peter Coonan), is sympathetic in the direction of Kathleen for causes which might be progressively revealed to be extra intricate than could first seem, inviting the teen over for dinner and customarily lending a pleasant ear. It’s quickly obvious that any trace of rejection is like poison to {the teenager}, who tends to lash out. Kathleen additionally retreats right into a fictional realm for consolation, as she lies to these round her about her childhood and movies Kardashian-style movies round her dwelling underneath the alias of ‘Kimmie’. 

Birthistle doesn’t labour the purpose and he or she additionally deploys recollections of Kathleen’s mum judiciously, in order that we see sufficient to get the image with out shedding the tense concentrate on right here and now. As Kathleen bonds with Dee over makeovers and meals, Doupe captures her internal battle, lacing the childlike hopefulness of her character with the watchful anxiousness of somebody who has been taught that good issues don’t final. Kathleen’s friendship with Dee comes loaded with all types of prospects – each optimistic and damaging – and the thought of turning fantasy into reality affords a harmful attract. 

Maybe unsurprisingly for an actor-turned-director, Birthistle offers her actors time and area to ship. A chat between Dee and Kathleen in a automobile because the rain beats down is allowed to assemble depth and he or she additionally pays consideration to physique language and proximity, permitting the bodily closeness between two ladies to tackle a cost. As a screenwriter, Birthistle imbues each characters with wealthy emotional element in order that the ladies’s relationship is much from a one-way road. Kathleen’s ambiguity in the direction of Conor can also be used as a possible flashpoint in a movie that carries a basic unease about what the unpredictable teenager may do similtaneously refusing to sit down in judgement over her due to it. Even when Kathleen is getting ready to dangerous decisions, Birthistle ensures we nonetheless care.