Review of A Girl Upstairs

 “Hi, I’m Mimi”: The Emotional Journey of “A Girl Upstairs”.

 

Above the Theater, Alone

 

Dulce, the protagonist, is an artist living with agoraphobia, terrified of stepping outside her apartment. Her small flat sits directly above a movie theater that screens classic films. On one wall is a wooden panel she can slide open to peer into the theater — a literal window between her secluded world and the life she cannot touch.

 

Her only contact with the outside world comes through indirect means: phone calls with her agent, muffled sounds from the theater below, and occasional shipments of her artwork. Still, she remains detached from the fate of her paintings. She never sees them in galleries or on anyone’s walls. They are not a bridge to connection, only a ritual of release.

 

Her emotional scars are rooted in childhood trauma. Through violent nightmares early in the film, we learn she was kidnapped as a child — an experience that crystallized into lifelong fear and deep isolation. Her apartment has become a fortress. Painting is her only form of movement.

 

The Arrival of the Skins

 

Dulce paints on traditional canvas, adhering to a rigid routine. This changes when she receives a shipment of unconventional materials from her art dealer — treated skins that are pliable, organic, and seemingly alive. These new surfaces behave differently under her brush.

 

When Dulce paints on them, something startling occurs: the images do not remain static. They begin to animate — to manifest. The figures she paints appear not just as illusions, but as physical presences. These are not symbolic hallucinations; they are real — both to her and to the audience.

 

Webster and Mimi: Her Divided Self

 

Her first creation is Webster, a calm, intelligent, emotionally grounded man who materializes in her apartment. He speaks, listens, and reasons. He becomes a stabilizing presence — a quiet mirror who reinforces, rather than challenges, her reclusive lifestyle. With Webster, Dulce feels safe. He reassures her that remaining indoors is justified.

 

Uncertain whether she is hallucinating or awakening, Dulce paints again — this time bringing forth Mimi. Mimi is everything Webster is not: sensual, impulsive, and irreverent. She mocks Dulce’s rules, teases Webster, and yearns to leave the apartment. More than that, she wants Dulce to want it too.

 

The tension between Webster and Mimi becomes the film’s emotional fulcrum. Webster represents caution, emotional steadiness, and self-containment. Mimi embodies desire, risk, and rebellion. They are not just characters, but facets of Dulce’s fragmented psyche — brought to life through the skins. These paintings do not merely animate art; they externalize the self.

 

Why Mimi Kills Webster

 

The strain between the two becomes unbearable. Dulce is pulled in opposite directions — between safety and liberation. The internal contradiction must resolve.

 

Mimi kills Webster. It’s not an act of cruelty, but one of psychological necessity.

 

Webster is not a villain. For most of the film, he offers stability — a way to exist without risk. However, as Mimi begins to challenge that comfort, his reassuring presence starts to feel like a quiet prison. His destruction is not rejection; it marks the emotional breakthrough of a woman ready to shed a part of herself.

 

This is not a murder. It is an emergence — a rupture from what no longer serves.

 

Integration Through Destruction

 

Mimi’s destruction of Webster is not about violence — it is about release. Dulce can no longer remain divided. She cannot move forward while tethered to the self that urges stillness. Webster’s presence affirms a life of retreat — one that becomes untenable with Mimi’s growing dominance.

 

Later, in the theater lobby, Dulce encounters the attendant — Webster’s real-world counterpart. Steady, present, and grounded, he is no longer imagined. He exists in the world she once avoided. This is proof: what once lived only on canvas now lives in reality. Dulce no longer needs to conjure him. She can meet him.

 

Her protective voice and rebellious voice are no longer externalized. They exist within her — not as conflict, but as integration.

 

The Final Passage

 

In the final scene of A Girl Upstairs, the film delivers a quiet yet powerful resolution.

 

First, we see Mimi — confident and impulsive — descending the stairs, leaving the apartment despite Dulce’s fear. This moment serves as a visual metaphor for breaking the seal of isolation.

 

Then, in the next beat, we see Dulce herself — wearing the same clothes — stepping through the apartment doorway and into the world.

 

This is not mimicry. It’s not a costume change. It is a moment of clarity. Mimi was never just a painting — she was Dulce’s repressed self, brought forth through art and finally accepted as truth. Crossing the threshold becomes a kind of baptism — not an escape, but a transition. From fear to life. From stasis to movement.

 

“Hi, I’m Mimi.”

 

She walks just a few steps — from her apartment door to the theater lobby — where she meets the attendant, the real-world reflection of Webster.

 

With quiet certainty, she introduces herself:

 

“Hi, I’m Mimi.”

 

This single line encapsulates the emotional arc of the film. Dulce is not role-playing. She is naming herself — not as a fantasy stepped into, but as a truth finally embraced. She no longer needs Webster to shield her or Mimi to push her. The push is now her own — no longer projected, no longer imagined.

 

She is Mimi now — not because she destroyed Webster, but because she no longer needs him. What they each represented has been resolved — no longer externalized, no longer split.

 

The film ends not with spectacle, but stillness — with a woman who once confined her life to imagination stepping into reality as her whole self. Not loudly. Not dramatically. Fully.

Director: Kevin Van Stevenson  

Cast: 

Holly Blair (as Dulce)  

Gustavo Cintra (as Webster)  

Sara Catherine Bellamy (as Mimi)