I’ve seen a lot of family dramas in my day, but none quite like Ghostlight. The family dynamic is dealt with in a unique way that is different than you’d ever expect. Kelly O’Sullivan uses the perspective of a tragedy to set off the events very nicely. Those events aren’t what anybody would expect from the director of Saint Frances.

Dan (Kieth Kuferer) is a construction worker by day and has to deal with a recent tragedy at night when he goes home to his wife Sharon (Tara Mallen) and daughter Daisy (Katherine Kuferer, Hello God, It’s Me Margaret), who’s having issues in school with her anger.  While working one day Dan stumbles onto a local theater company. He gets convinced by one of their company, Rita (Dolly De’Leone, Triangle of Sadness) to come and see what they are all about. What he finds is comfort and a way to put his day-to-day life on hold for a little while each day.

I haven’t quite seen a family dynamic like this before in a film. This family portraying the three leads are actually a family in real life. All solid actors in their own right, but as part of this ensemble they are terrific together. I truly felt like they knew each other so well that it made their performances opposite one another that much better. They were all very good in their roles. Kieth Kuferer stole the show as far as a leading performance goes. He went to a place with a role that I was very surprised he had in him. De’Leone added a bit of a comedic element that this serious film needed desperately. 

There are two separate stories going on in this film. They parallel each other very well. The personal struggles the family is going through are quite a dramatic thing they have to deal with. Alongside that is the theater stuff where the troupe is doing a production of Romeo and Juliet. This isn’t an easy thing for someone who isn’t a trained actor. Kieth Kuferer’s character isn’t that by a long shot. He struggles with some help from the theater company and his daughter who has been doing this sort of thing for a little while now in the context of the film. There are references to her doing Oklahoma. At the beginning of the movie, a song from that production plays. These theater scenes are funny, touching, and emotional all at the same time. The filmmakers balance both sides of this film perfectly.

As part of a family dynamic when I was younger I can relate to this story somewhat. I’m not a family man now as an adult, but I’ve been around friends who have lost a loved one. My own mother died quite young, but that doesn’t compare to losing a child. I worked with a woman who lost her son in the Gulf War in the 2000s. It is not an easy experience for anybody to deal with. The family in this movie dealt with it as expected except for the theater stuff which turned into a coping mechanism for the father and later the other family members. This script was very well thought out by O’Sullivan. 

I liked the setting of small-town America for this film. The fact that a construction worker would stumble upon a theater troupe in the process of doing his job was very interesting.  People know people in a small town and nothing is secret. This was an intimate story that could have happened in any town, in any state in America. I like that aspect of the film. O’Sullivan and directing partner Alex Thompson thought of all the details in this little family drama. With comedy thrown in for good measure.

Ghostlight is quite an emotional experience especially for those who’ve lost a loved one. The writer O’Sullivan and her directing partner did a great job exploring loss and its many effects. The family dynamic was performed fantastically by an actual family Kuferer, Mallen, and their daughter. I’m not much of a theater guy myself, but these scenes added much-needed levity to a very serious film. IFC has a winner on their hands. Hopefully, people will go see it when they have the opportunity. 

4 stars

Dan Skip Allen