Olivia Colman, an Academy Award-winning actress, consistently delivers compelling and subtle performances. While she’s widely recognized for her work in projects like *The Favourite*, *Broadchurch*, and *The Crown*, one role often goes unnoticed. Colman played Leda Caruso in Maggie Gyllenhaal’s first time directing a film, *The Lost Daughter* (2021), alongside Dakota Johnson, Paul Mescal, Jessie Buckley, and Ed Harris.
Adapted from Elena Ferrante’s novel, *The Lost Daughter* first premiered at the Venice International Film Festival and went on to receive widespread critical praise after screenings at other festivals and its release on Netflix. The film is a deeply moving and thought-provoking exploration of the complexities of motherhood and the mother-daughter relationship, with Olivia Colman delivering a nuanced and unforgettable performance as the central character, Leda, in this psychological drama.
Olivia Colman’s Leda Is a Complex Anti-Heroine in The Lost Daughter
I’m so excited about this film! It follows Professor Leda Caruso, a literature expert, who goes to Greece for a quiet summer break. She’s hoping to get some work done, but she quickly becomes fascinated by a young mother, Nina, and her family she meets on the beach. I found myself really drawn into Leda’s observations of Nina – how she handles motherhood, her relationship with her husband, and all the little struggles she faces. Leda seems strangely captivated by her, and I’m eager to see where that takes the story.
The film uses flashbacks to reveal Leda’s past as a young mother to Martha and Bianca. We see her juggling motherhood with her career and personal life, and it wasn’t easy. She married and had children young, and her daughters were constantly needing attention, which often overwhelmed her. Leda frequently felt angry and, desperate for a moment of quiet, would sometimes ignore them. As she observes Nina and Elena, Leda recognizes her younger self in their struggles – particularly Nina, who is constantly scrutinized by others offering unsolicited parenting advice. The story takes a turn when Elena goes missing, and Leda helps Nina find her. However, Leda impulsively steals Elena’s favorite doll.
Despite her daughter’s distress over the lost doll, Nina refuses to give it back. Instead, she starts caring for the doll, buying it clothes, and playing with it – almost as if it’s a second chance at being a mother to the children she’s lost. While this behavior seems unsettling, Olivia Colman’s performance evokes more pity than disgust, which is a testament to her skill as an actress. She plays the role with subtlety, quietly revealing the emotional burden of motherhood and the lasting impact of past trauma.
The film gradually reveals that Leda struggled with the demands of motherhood. Over three years, she felt overwhelmed and essentially abandoned her parental duties, leaving her children in the care of her husband while she lived independently. This difficult period continues to affect her, causing ongoing issues like vertigo and other mental health challenges. Actress Olivia Colman brilliantly portrays these struggles through subtle cues – a change in her eyes, a slight tremor, and fleeting facial expressions – all enhanced by the film’s beautiful visuals.
The film features a rare and complex female character who unapologetically focuses on her own desires, even when it challenges what’s considered right or wrong. *The Lost Daughter* bravely explores the uncomfortable truths about motherhood and gives a voice to experiences often absent from mainstream movies. Olivia Colman delivers a powerful performance, bringing incredible vulnerability to the role of Leda, a woman whose choices are difficult to understand. While abandoning her daughters for years is clearly wrong, the film evokes empathy for Leda, particularly through her tender care for a doll, which seems to represent her maternal instincts. The movie avoids simple judgment, instead inviting viewers to experience Leda’s world and grapple with her complicated reality.
Leda is deeply remorseful for her actions, even seeming to believe she deserves Nina’s harsh words as a consequence for her past mistakes. She visibly battles intense emotional turmoil, experiencing unexpected fits of anger and sadness. Some believe she never fully recovered from postpartum depression, which fueled her feelings of resentment towards her children and her need for distance. Others theorize that Leda, deeply troubled herself, stole the doll intentionally to inflict on Nina the same pain she experienced with her own daughters, Martha and Bianca. She seemingly wanted another mother to understand her suffering, and by upsetting Bianca with the stolen doll, she hoped to cause Nina distress as well.
Regardless of what actually happened, Leda is portrayed as a deeply flawed and self-centered person. The actor does an excellent job of showing this complexity, leaving the audience unsure whether they should feel sympathy for her or not.
The Lost Daughter Explores the Darker Side of Motherhood
Although *The Lost Daughter* focuses on motherhood, it feels more like a suspenseful psychological thriller. It avoids sentimentality and instead explores the challenging and often unsettling realities of being both a mother and a daughter, creating a gripping and unpredictable experience. The film doesn’t offer easy answers or let you clearly pick a side, and that’s precisely what makes it so compelling.
From the moment a woman becomes pregnant, society often places unspoken demands on mothers, expecting them to prioritize their children above all else. While movies often portray idealized versions of motherhood, *The Lost Daughter* explores the difficult realities many women face. Both Nina and Leda experience constant challenges with their daughters – their patience is tested, personal boundaries are crossed, and their time is continually consumed – pushing them to their limits. It’s simple to tell a woman how to be a good mother, but the actual experience is far more complicated than people realize.
This is clear in a conversation between Callie and Leda. Callie, though not a mother herself, states that it’s impossible to forget things about your children. Leda responds by suggesting Callie is speaking from personal experience, implying that only mothers truly understand the difficulties of raising children.
Beyond exploring motherhood, the movie offers a realistic look at what it’s like to be a daughter. It shows how mothers’ struggles and reactions can negatively affect their children, and even illustrates the lasting impact on them. The film barely mentions Leda and Nina’s mothers, and when it does, it portrays them negatively, suggesting they too may have been raised with poor parenting. This leads to the idea that much of the anger and frustration displayed by the characters might be a result of behaviors they learned from their own mothers when they were growing up.
The film portrays a cycle of mother-daughter loss, where Leda and Nina, and subsequently their daughters, all experience a sense of being lost. Crucially, Maggie Gyllenhaal avoids judgment in the story; she doesn’t present a ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ side, instead inviting viewers to simply observe these characters’ lives – both the good and the bad – and connect with their emotions. The movie bravely explores the difficult side of motherhood, and even acknowledging these challenges is a positive step forward.
I was completely captivated by *The Lost Daughter*. It’s not a film that shies away from the complexities of motherhood – it doesn’t present it as simply blissful, but acknowledges the heartache and struggles too. The acting is so subtle and powerful, really digging into the internal conflicts of the characters. What struck me most is how the film embraces *all* sides of being a mother, the good and the bad, and that honesty is what makes it truly special and deserving of all the praise it’s gotten.
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2025-10-18 02:40