In the Name of My Daughter

Starring Catherine Deneuve, who portrays the real life Renee LaRoux, a casino boss who is at odds with her daughter, Agnes (Adele Haenel). Agnes lived in Africa and was married for a few years but is recently divorced and has come back to Nice to recover and begin her life's new Chapter. Agnes is athletic and free spirited. When picked up at the airport by her mother's lawyer and personal assistant, Maurice Agnelet, she chooses to go to the ocean and swim in the off season. 

The methodical Renee increasingly quarrels with her daughter over the fate of the casino and Agnes's rights to her inheritance from her father. Agnes is sophisticated and talented but does seem very emotional for what it would take to run a business, that's as large and demanding as a casino empire. 

The problems increase when Agnes decides to become one of Maurice's many lovers. Renee warns her daughter he is only interested in her for her money and for sex but the elder's thoughts are angrily ignored. While his own business is failing he persuades Agnes to outvote her mother from the Casino. He becomes Agnes's world. 

Agnes looses her dignity by following Maurice to school when he picks up his son and he treats her viciously. But she does not end it and after her suicide attempt he comes to her apartment to help. She is never seen again and all her inheritance goes into his bank account after her disappearance. 

Renee devotes much of her life to finding justice for her lost daughter. She forgives all of Agnes's mistakes and betrayals for as to her mother Agnes is forever a little girl. Eventually thirty years later the case is re-opened and brought to trial. 

By Sarah Bahl