The novel on which this film of the same title is inspired is about the semi-reclusive mother Bernadette, once one of the world’s most promising architects, who goes missing after her daughter leaves for boarding school. It documents how her software engineer husband and daughter search for her in a non-linear epistolary format, piecing together clues about her disappearance and frame of mind from letters, emails and other documents.
The film stars Cate Blanchett as Bernadette and Billy Crudup as her husband; Emma Nelson plays the teenage daughter, Bee. But whereas Bernadatte is missing for most of the novel, she dominates the film and by the time she goes missing it is obvious where she's gone. The only mystery is why she's going and how she'll get there.
