Die Frau am Strand (2014)

A car is speeding along a coastal road in Norway when it veers off the road and overturns. It is almost a miracle that the driver survives the crash with only a few minor injuries. The woman is top executive Brigitta Nielebeck, who suffered transient global amnesia in the accident. She knows neither who she is nor where she was going. At the hospital, Dr. Brandstrüp explains that he would have known who she was even without the papers she had with her. He shows her a book she wrote, remarking that until a year ago she had been one of Norway’s most successful women, but then she had stopped working to turn her attention to new challenges, or so he had been told. Since Brigitta’s ex-husband is in South Africa, Dr. Brandstrüp decides to contact Brigitta’s 16-year-old daughter, Marie. However, Marie has been living with a foster family for more than two years. She has completely lost touch with her mother. Marie does not want to be reminded of her former life, as she associates that time with loneliness and painful losses. Her foster mother, Wibeke Berglund, tells Marie that no skid marks were found and that her mother had not been wearing a seat belt either, suggesting that it was not an accident but an attempt to leave her life behind. It is only thanks to the encouragement of her foster mother Wibeke that Marie is willing to try to help her biological mother. Since the Nielebecks own a beach house right by the sea, the women agree to Brigitta’s wish to go there, hoping to bring back her memories. It is also the place where the family used to be truly happy. Marie says that the family spent every summer at the beach house. Wibeke hints that there had been serious difficulties between her and Marie. However, Marie has told her almost nothing about her past. Wibeke is also the one who keeps Brigitta and her impatience in check. Then one day, Marie talks to Wibeke. She tells her about her love for a young man, and how she and her boyfriend had not been careful, and then she was pregnant and all hell broke loose. Her parents blamed her, saying she was only fourteen and was ruining her life. She had desperately wanted to keep her baby, but her parents had their way. She could not cope with it, started taking drugs, and went off the rails. Her parents tried to sort everything out with money; arguments became a regular occurrence, and eventually they separated. Mother and daughter slowly begin to grow close again, thanks in large part to Wibeke’s patient mediation. At Wibeke’s request, Brigitta’s ex-husband turns up. Kurt is a successful architect and businessman who seems to have long since put the past and the family’s serious problems behind him. Through Kurt, Brigitta learns more about the past. When Marie was no longer there, everything had been dark and empty. In the end, they had both been drinking; she had also been taking pills, and he had hit her three times. Separation was the only option. Before Kurt leaves again, he casts doubt on Brigitta’s continuing amnesia. He tells Wibeke pointedly that his ex-wife had always got what she wanted, and in this case, she had wanted to have her child with her. But it is only that night that Brigitta’s memory returns, showing her images from the past. She rushes to the beach and collapses there in tears. When Wibeke catches her on the phone the next morning, all she wants to know is when Brigitta’s memory came back. Brigitta then asks her to give her another 48 hours with her child. After a happy day at the amusement park, Brigitta gives herself away and once again incurs her daughter’s anger. The upshot is that Brigitta gets into the car to finish what she failed to do the first time, as Marie puts it. While the women try to catch up with Brigitta, Marie tells her foster mother that her parents had made an appointment for her to have an abortion, even though she had so desperately wanted to have the baby. Her boyfriend had been on his way to her that day; he wanted to stand by her and keep their child too. To get there before the fateful procedure could take place, he drove too fast and crashed. That night, two people died—the father and the child. With Kurt’s help, as he is once again on his way to the beach house, they manage to stop Brigitta from carrying out her plan. She apologizes to her daughter, saying she should have done better. Like Marie, Kurt assures Brigitta that he does not want her to leave either. They both accept Marie’s decision to stay with the Berglunds, because they are good for her. In the future, however, they plan to see one another more often and spend more time together.