When it came to allowing for the rights to be given for her novel The Lost Daughter, Elena Ferrante only had one specific dictum; the film must be directed by a woman. That woman was found in Maggie Gyllenhall, with this thrilling dark and contemplative drama marking her debut as a writer and as a director, and although there are certain moments where a lack of subtlety could be prescribed to ‘the first film’ of it all, this really is one of the most promising and exciting debuts I’ve seen in some time.
The Lost Daughter is a confounding and darkly bleak tale that faces up to a truth that anybody with a mother I feel just chooses to ignore. The simple fact that at times their own mother may very well have hated being just that. With this theme being the basis of much of the plot and character study at the heart of this film, one can find very easily whilst watching it how controversial it may very well be to a mainstream audience. Pair that with a general ambiguity within certain elements of its narrative and you quickly find yourself with a very divisive film. Gyllenhall has chosen to simply pull no punches and delivers a sublime character study of a woman in two key periods of her life, Leda, as she in the main narrative goes on a holiday alone later in her life and finds herself drawn to a younger mother caught in the turmoil of her own life, aswell as an extended flashback narrative running concurrently which informs and juxtaposes the present day storyline exploring Leda’s relationship to her children when they were younger and an affair that quite possibly was her last chance at great true happiness. Gyllenhall weaves these narratives together beautifully and with a craft in composition that makes the film fly by without ever feeling jagged or rough around the edges, it flows effortlessly helped tremendously by the edit of Alfonso Goncalves. Gyllenhall too exploits the great beauty of the tropical location of the present day with some stunning cinematography by Helene Louvart, again brutally juxtaposed with the griminess of an 80’s London frequently. But also above all this artistic ambiguity and grand themes studied, the majority of the plotting shares more with the 90’s from hell thrillers than anything else, which also helps the films pacing and plot progression.
However fundamentally the films greatest asset by far is the sublime work of its performers. Olivia Colman. I mean... She’s our Meryl. Everything she touches she conveys with such beauty and power and truth, whether it be in the most acute and bizarre of films, the most human of dramas, or even the broadest or most realistic of comedies. Her Leda here is no such step down and is another incredible depthful and powerful turn in her oeuvre. Her talent defies bounds, and in some beautifully casted acknowledging, under her as her younger self we have Jessie Buckley one of our other finest performers. Buckley and Colman here both share mannerisms and slight affectations that convey the life of the same woman across two totally different periods, it’s the sort of subtle excellence that does appear in a lot of the films performance choices, aswell as many moments in its writing, but to a lesser extent. Dakota Johnson too delivers a performance balancing her greatest talents as a performer, although we have still yet to receive the perfect comedy vehicle for her to convey the mightiness of her comedy. Although the joke is easy to make that Gyllehnhall cast her own husband as the absolute object of Leda’s affections, the joke’s a cheap one, Peter Sarsgaard is excellent as always and manages to convey with his own vulnerability the fragility of the affair, whilst also being a completely believable object of adoration. Ed Harris, Paul Mescal, Dagmara Dominczyk and Panos Koronis all do further great work as this incredible ensemble grows and grows throughout the film. Overall if a person needs to prescribe the absolute greatest strength of The Lost Daughter it would have to be the performances, although as aforementioned the film also has more than enough other strengths to go around, and perhaps those performances would be lesser if they were working with lesser material (although I do doubt it, not these actors).
Gyllenhal’s debut is a strong and stellar 8/10 with some of the absolute best performances of the year and some of the most compelling writing. Gyllenhall has a craft a tale of two women in two times, who are of course one in the same, with the craft and elegance of a filmmaker far beyond their debut (whatever that actually counts for). The film is stunningly dark and deeply compelling and although a focus on a few too many obvious metaphors and visual images may have hindered it slightly, one cannot deny that the film boasts one of our finest modern casts and delivers a trio of some of the finest performances of the year. And with Colman, perhaps even the best.
P.S. Jack Farthing was excellent in both Spencer and this, but please man, tell your agent to break the horrible pathetic husband mould with the next role. But then again you’ve also starred in two of the best films of the year with two great very different performances, so in actuality I think your agents doing some great work.
- - Thomas Carruthers
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