Kunsang Kyirong’s debut feature “100 Sunset,” which has its world premiere at TIFF this weekend, is filled with images of characters looking, often trying to see without being seen.
Its protagonist, Kunsel (Tenzin Kunsel), is an 18-year old girl who spends her time rubbernecking at the other residents of the Parkdale apartment complex where she lives with her aunt and uncle. Her burgeoning fascination with one of her neighbours — Passang (Sonam Choekyi), a young Tibetan immigrant like herself, seemingly lonely and trapped in a presumably unfulfilled marriage to an older man — catalyzes a narrative charged with a sense of everyday enigma, with characters trying to get to the bottom of their own impulses and desires.
“Living in Parkdale, you’re constantly aware of the ways people are watching,” says Kyirong, who was born in Vancouver but is very familiar with Toronto’s west end, having visited family members there as a teen and corresponded online with other Tibetan residents.
“Whether it’s in apartment blocks with windows facing each other, or just the small intimacies of daily life in close quarters, that naturally carries a sense of voyeurism, and I wanted to lean into that.”
Working with cinematographer Nikolay Michaylov, a talented veteran of Toronto’s contemporary independent filmmaking scene, Kyirong devised a sophisticated visual style that transformed the neighborhood’s architecture into a character in its own right.
“A huge part of our shooting philosophy involved shooting through things,” she says. “People, windows, mirrors and doorways, often inspired by objects and layouts that were already present in some of the apartments. This not only created a sense of emotional distance but also heightened the feeling of voyeurism.”
Given the story’s myriad motifs of peeping, Kyirong admits that Alfred Hitchcock’s classic “Rear Window” was on her mind, but adds that she doesn’t see her film as a thriller per se.
“The suspense comes less from plot twists and more from that tension of looking, of what’s revealed and what remains hidden,” she explains. “Instead of a single mystery, the ‘mystery’ here is really the fabric of the community itself.”
It’s the paradoxical aspects of that fabric — simultaneously tightly knit and fraying around the edges — that gives “100 Sunset” its rich and enveloping sense of texture. The plot hinges significantly on a rotating communal credit system known as dhikuti, in which individual participants receive rotating monthly payouts from a group pot. Here, solidarity and resentment become two sides of the same coin.
“When I first learned about dhikuti, I was fascinated by it,” says Kyirong. “Especially how deeply it relies on trust. The more people involved, the larger the pool of money. There’s no safety net if someone disappears with an early payout.”
Kyirong cast “100 Sunset” with non-professional actors drawn from the neighbourhood. Kunsel is the daughter of the friend of a crew member, and Kyriong met Choekyi while the latter was working as a server at a local Tibetan restaurant.
“I worked with the two (leads) separately for some time before introducing them to each other,” says Kyirong. “I don’t want to embarrass them too much, but their personalities are actually quite similar to those of their characters. I was writing and rewriting the script throughout this process, so I was able to lean into their personalities. Kunsel was very shy, sometimes wouldn’t talk at all. Sonam was bubbly, I think maybe her openness made Kunsel uncomfortable at times.”
The dynamic works perfectly onscreen. At once precise and suggestive, “100 Sunset” vibrates on dual frequencies of intimacy and unease that make it one of the most accomplished Canadian debuts in recent memory.
