‘Pieces of a Woman’ Offers a Remarkably Cohesive Narrative of Grief

Opening with a wide shot of a half-finished bridge, each end anchored to a fog-veiled skyline, Mundruczó’s “Pieces of a Woman” is a film about the intangible bridges burnt and built in the wake of emotional trauma. Striking cinematography and a standout performance by Vanessa Kirby combine to create a wrenching depiction of a young woman’s interior self through a collage of carefully crafted exterior details. Its only shortcoming occurs at the end, which sacrifices some of the film’s resonance for the sake of closure.

Kirby stars as Martha Weiss alongside Shia LaBeouf as her partner Sean Carson, a construction worker on the bridge from the opening shot. The couple are expecting a baby very soon, and there is a sense of anticipation in the air as they pick up their new car, a practical gray minivan. “This is us now,” Martha remarks, referring to their family of three. But when their baby’s home birth goes terribly wrong and the wailing ambulance sirens fade to a suffocating black, that same “us” disintegrates.

In the next scene, Martha walks briskly along the street, her coat a jarring red against the pale, washed-out neutrals of her surroundings. Her face betrays little emotion as she suffers prying stares from coworkers and smothering condolences from an encounter with a family friend. The film begins to settle into a softer rhythm — gone are the abrupt, swinging cuts of the camera leading up to the baby’s birth and the maze-like claustrophobia it created. Now, slow tracking shots and close-ups of Kirby allow a study of grief in all its subtleties: Though Martha rarely cries, the set of her mouth and the detached look in her eyes convey her aching loss.

The progression of time is tracked by recurring shots of the bridge under construction as the weather gives way to New England winter. Desperately trying to find who is responsible for the tragedy, Martha’s family presses charges against the midwife present at the birth, introducing a layer of legal proceedings that does nothing to alleviate Martha’s pain. There is a sense of perpetual incompletion throughout the film; even as the two ends of the bridge draw closer to one another, the relationships in Martha’s life — with her mother, with Sean — splinter apart into simmering tensions and regrettable words. Mundruczó makes ample use of symbolism, and while certain moments veer towards cliche, others elicit a raw, intimate pain: a shot of two withered plants separated by a windowsill after a fight with Sean, the yoga ball used during her pregnancy deflating sadly when she stubs out her cigarette, Martha saving the seeds from her apple while watching the children next to her on the subway. It is difficult not to get attached to those tiny seeds, as Martha researches books on sprouting and places each one tenderly between cotton pads, offering a glimmer of hope for the first time.

The film is not easy to watch, both emotionally and visually. Clear shots are few and far between, and the audience’s view is often obstructed or distorted. The edges of windows, doorways, and car dashboards cut through frames, while characters are often seen through glass panes and in partial mirror reflections, lending them a certain disembodied isolation. In particular, the baby’s nursery room is shot in a way that never allows the viewer entry beyond a static rectangle enclosed by the door frame as Martha packs away toys and books. “Why’re you trying to disappear my kid?” Sean pleads, to which she responds brusquely, “Because we don’t have a kid.” In a film that is less plot-driven, these visual manipulations give the emotional states of the characters a sharp, dimensional reality.

LaBeouf delivers a convincing performance as Sean, though his character conforms to stereotypical standards of masculinity in a way that can make him feel more like a stereotype than a person. It seems like the film recognizes this, but is unable to come up with a solution, opting instead to cut him out of the picture entirely with a hasty explanation. In a way, it works, forcing Martha to confront her pain independently and directly — a shift signified by the stable, unobstructed shots of her face as she speaks to her mother, and later on, to the courtroom.

The film is able to hold on to its quiet momentum throughout a two-hour runtime, building up to a finale that is beautifully constructed. Yet its careful detail feels almost too heavy-handed, falling short of the authenticity in Kirby’s portrayal. For the sake of closing his metaphors neatly, Mundruczó pulls together all of his symbols at once, offering a sense of closure that hasn’t quite been earned. Nevertheless, “Pieces of a Woman” remains a powerful, graceful meditation on grief, leaving its audience with that same lingering, bittersweet ache of biting into an apple core.