I've Loved You So Long (2008)

Philippe Claudel's French language film explores a woman's struggle to find her place in society after fifteen years in prison. The story opens as Lea (Elsa Zylberstein) greets her older sister, Juliette (Kristin Scott Thomas) at the prison to take her home. Near strangers now, Lea was a young child when Juliette mysteriously disappeared and her parents stopped talking about her.

When a social worker contacted her about offering Juliette a home upon release, Lea was eager to help. Now married with two young daughters, she generously invites Juliette to share her warm and cheerful home life, a choice her husband is not happy about. Juliette is quietly appreciative, but distant until she is coaxed to open up and tell the truth about that tragic event that changed her life. Once a doctor and mother, she is without an identity. She cooks, cleans, swims, learns to relate to her young nieces. The love of her new family allows her wounds to heal in order to to find work and build a new life.

Kristin Scott Thomas expresses so much by doing so little. This is a beautiful film about loss and second chances.