Angela Molina, Charlie Plummer, Claudio Santamaria, drama, film festivals, Juliette Binoche, Marwan Kenzari, movies, Ralph Fiennes, reviews, The Return, TIFF, Toronto International Film Festival, Uberto Pasolini
December 16, 2024
by Carla Hay
Directed by Uberto Pasolini
Culture Representation: Taking place in ancient Europe and Africa, the dramatic film “The Return” (based on Homer’s epic poem “The Odyssey”) features a predominantly white cast of characters (with a few black people and Asians) representing the working-class, middle-class and royalty.
Culture Clash: After the Trojan War, Greek king Odysseus finds his way back home to the Greek island of Ithaca, only to find out that he has been presumed dead, his son dislikes him, and several aggressive suitors are pressuring his wife to marry again.
Culture Audience: “The Return” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of the movie’s headliners and Homer’s “The Odyssey” and don’t mind watching a slow-paced Greek mythology story.
“The Return” is a flawed but watchable interpretation of Homer’s epic poem “The Odyssey.” This drama’s sluggish pacing and mediocre supporting performances are held together and uplifted by admirable lead performances from Ralph Fiennes and Juliette Binoche. Even though “The Odyssey” is fiction and part of Greek mythology, some of the movie’s action scenes still look too unrealistic to take seriously.
Directed by Uberto Pasolini, “The Return” was written by Pasolini, Edward Bond and John Collee. “The Return” had its world premiere at the 2024 Toronto International and screened at other film festivals in 2024, including the Rome Film Festival. The movie was filmed in Italy and in Greece.
“The Return” begins by with this caption: “After 10 years of carnage, the city of Troy has fallen and the victorious Greeks set sail for home, Years pass on the island of Ithaca. Queen Penelope still longs for the return of her husband Odysseus. Her son Telemachus waits of the father he never knew. While restless suitors lay waste the land and press the queen to choose a new king.”
Of course, this is only half of the story. People who know about “The Odyssey” and who can figure out from this movie’s title, Odysseus (played by Fiennes) does indeed make his return to Ithaca. He is first seen in “The Return” when he’s naked, unconscious and marooned on the rocks of a beach. The return of Odysseus is also shown in the trailer of “The Return,” which reveals about 80% of the movie’s plot.
The first third of “The Return” is a repetitive loop of Odysseus trying to find his way back home to Ithaca from Troy, alternating with scenes of Penelope (played by Binoche) grieving but still hopeful that Odysseus (who is presumed dead by most people) will return to Ithaca. Telemachus (played by Charlie Plummer), a pouty heir in his 20s, despises Odysseus because he thinks Odysseus has abandoned the family. Penelope lives with Telemachus and Odysseus’ mother Eurycleia (played by Ángela Molina), who is also holding out hope that Odysseus is still alive and will return home.
Telemachus is perceived as too wimpy to be the next king, so he is mercilessly bullied by the suitors are loitering around the royal home and hoping that Penelope will choose one of them to be her next husband. Many of these suitors would like to see Telemachus dead, but their top priority is to gain power by marrying Penelope. One of the missed opportunities in “The Return” is in how underdeveloped most of the characters are. Almost all of these suitors have generic personalities.
The exception is Antinous (played by Marwan Kenzari), a wealthy merchant who is the movie’s obvious chief villain from the moment that Antinous is seen on screen. Antinous is not the biggest or the strongest suitor, but he is the most manipulative and is most cunning of the suitors. At first, he tries to use Telemachus to get to Penelope.
Antinous asks Telemachus, after seeing how the other suitors are harassing Telemachus: “Why don’t you tell her to choose me? I’ll get rid of them [the other suitors] all. I’ll get the island working again. I’ll treat you fairly.” Telemachus’ contemptuous response is to say to Antinous: “You think you’re better than them.” Antinous immediately ends his “nice guy” act with Telemachus and sneers, “Poor boy. If it weren’t for me, you’d be dead a long time ago.”
Even though Telemachus and Antinous are at odds with each other, Telemachus still wants Penelope to make up her mind on which suitor she’ll choose because he wants the suitors’ bullying to stop. Penelope tells Telemachus: “I will choose when I finish your father’s shroud,” she says of a shroud that she has been weaving and seems to have no intention of completing. Later, when Telemachus grows impatient with Penelope and calls her a “whore,” Telemachus’ mother Eurycleia slaps him.
About halfway through the movie, Odysseus finds his way back to Ithaca with the help of a slave/swine herder named Eumeo (played by Claudio Santamaria), who becomes Odysseus’ trusted friend. Odysseus is dirty and disheveled and assumed to be a homeless beggar when he arrives in Ithaca. He has been away for so long, almost no one recognizes Odysseus as the returning king. The only one who immediately knows who he is his mother Eurycleia, but Odysseus wants to reveal his identity on his own terms.
The last third of the film (which has almost no suspense) shows how Odysseus eventually reveals himself to certain people. Odysseus’ plan doesn’t make a lot of sense and doesn’t look very believable in the context of this movie. It’s understandable that Telemachus wouldn’t recognize Odysseus, because Telemachus was too young to remember Odysseus when Odysseus went off to war. It’s much harder to believe that Penelope wouldn’t recognize Odysseus once she sees him up close and hears him talk.
“The Odyssey” is not easy to adapt into a feature-length film, but “The Return” oversimplifies “The Odyssey” to the point where much of the poem’s intrigue is stripped from the movie. For example, in “The Odyssey,” Eurycleia is Odysseus’ housekeeper, not his mother. And in “The Odyssey,” the goddess of Athena (the Greek goddess of war and wisdom) interferes and prevents Penelope from hearing Eurycleia, who wants to tell Penelope that Odysseus has returned.
There are no Greek gods and goddesses in “The Return,” perhaps because”The Return” filmmakers wanted it to be more of a “realistic” drama. However, the absence of Greek gods and goddesses in a classic Greek mythology story is a detriment to “The Return,” which doesn’t do enough with the human characters to make up for the lack of distinctive personalities from Greek gods and goddesses. It just makes it even more unbelievable that Penelope wouldn’t recognize Odysseus, compared to “The Odyssey’s” original explanation that Penelope had a spell put on her by Athena.
What saves “The Return” from being a completely boring dud is the commanding performance of Fiennes as Odysseus. Binoche also succeeds in portraying someone who is both strong-willed and vulnerable, although the movie undermines Penelope’s intelligence by her inability to recognize Odysseus when Penelope has up-close conversations with him. The rest of the performances in “The Return” are unremarkable or border on portraying caricatures—no thanks to the movie’s often-clunky dialogue.
“The Return” has some predictable action scenes toward the end of the film, when Odysseus fights his way to respectability while pretending to be a pauper. The movie also has striking moments because of above-average cinematography from Marius Panduru and an effective music score from Rachel Portman. “The Return” is an acceptable way to pass the time for anyone interested in cinematic versions of Greek mythology, but “The Return” is not essential viewing for anyone with a casual interest in these types of movies.
Bleecker Street released “The Return” in U.S. cinemas on December 6, 2024.