Abstract

Maggie Gyllenhaal´s film The lost daughter -an adaptation from Elena Ferrante´s novel “The dark daughter”- addresses the issue of woman´s desire as not reducible to the desire of motherhood, installing a conflict with other desires for personal and sexual fulfillment. The film can be read as a criticism to the social commandment addressed to women to dedicate themselves as wives and mothers. From this critique to the patriarchal order, the character of Leda is an Ibsenian heroine. But that aspect of the film is insufficient to explain her behavior. The scene in the beach of a young mother with her little daughter and her doll, forces her to reconsider her past decisions. There is an ignored dimension in her as a daughter, that opens us to the effects of maternal havoc on the mother-daughter bond.

Keywords: desire | maternal havoc | responsibility | guilt