Actor Maggie Gyllenhaal’s assured debut as writer-director, The Lost Daughter, relocates Elena Ferrante’s novel to a Greek island, where Olivia Colman’s divorced academic, Leda, seems to identify a fellow traveler in maternal ambivalence in Dakota Johnson’s visiting American.
Bringing a probing perspective to its reflections on female relationships, motherhood and women’s struggle to carve a professional space outside it, this film dives into its heroine’s interiority via another astonishing performance from Colman, who should score a Best Actress Oscar nomination.
Her role is equaled in flashbacks by Jessie Buckley, playing the character in her younger years, who should also get Oscar attention in the Supporting Actress category.
