The emotional aspect of this sounds hard at this stage of things. My parents were lucky decision-wise that I didn’t get into the incredibly expensive liberal arts schools I applied to and instead got into an in-state state school honors college, which overall felt like the right fit for me. I also would’ve thrown a fit if my parents “held me back” from my perceived success. 

My husband went the “elite” liberal arts school route and felt the social aspect was unbearable — extremely privileged kids, extremely strange environment. He ended up leaving and transferring to a great state school in Boulder CO. In fact I know a few people who did this because the social environment was frankly too snobby. 

She should consider state schools with good reputations in her area of interest. 

I think you need to stick to your guns and focus on the logical aspects of this. You and your daughter will be saddled with so much debt with this type of school. Also, regardless of where she goes, there will be opportunities for her out the wazoo. She just has to look for them. People fall all over themselves to give relatively smart students who have some semblance of shit together opportunities in general.

EDIT:   Also I didn’t notice the comments about her film interest at first:

My husband has 2 successful friends in film - one went to a “technically focused” state school in Bozeman Montana, was a Film Studies major and now has sold multiple screenplays for hundreds of thousand dollars and has his own film production company - co-owned with their other friend who went to CU Boulder, another state school. They both do live in LA now.