The Lost Daughter

Maggie Gyllenhaal makes a bold, self-assured directorial début with this adaptation of Italian novelist Elena Ferrante’s La figlia oscura (2008). The Lost Daughter is the story of Leda Caruso (Olivia Colman), a divorced middle-aged college professor on a working holiday in Greece. When a rowdy, somewhat menacing family from Queens arrives to spend their summer on the same island, it disturbs Leda’s peace and quiet. She soon develops a fixation on a beautiful young mother in the clan (Dakota Johnson) who seems to be struggling with the constant needs of her toddler daughter. When the child goes missing, it triggers a series of memories for Leda that cause her to behave in strange ways

Gyllenhaal proves adept at injecting tension into scenes that would otherwise seem mundane, aided by an enigmatic performance from Colman, and a sympathetic turn by Jessie Buckley, who plays Leda as a young mother in the flashbacks. Despite its warm, sunny setting, the film is permeated with a sense of dark unknown dread. And we’re constantly surprised by the smallest of narrative turns. Buried secrets are uncovered, yet they are not the usual tropes of melodrama. A crime is committed, though it’s more of a moral transgression. A mystery develops, but it doesn’t build to any kind of grand reveal. The glimpses into the past make us slowly more and more aware of what eats at Leda. Nonetheless, we’re never granted full access to her thoughts and motivations.

Using far fewer words than the typical literary adaptation, Gyllenhaal doesn't spell everything out for us. Instead, she relies on her actors to convey the characters' thoughts and internal conflicts. The film’s frank look at motherhood, already transgressive even in this Anglicized telling, is all the more unsettling and powerful because of what the movie holds back. Our desire to understand Leda aligns her to us far more than any internal monologue or explanatory revelation could provide. We may judge Leda for her actions but the compassionate kinship we come to feel for this sometimes-prickly individual is unshakeable.