The Return

I associated the color gray with this film. Everything about the plot was kind of hazy. The father created an atmosphere of suspicion throughout the film. I do not feel as though I could say with absolute certainty what he was up to and what his motives were. Although The Return took place in St. Petersburg, I feel as though a different aspect of St. Petersburg was highlighted by the film. I would guess that Brother mainly took place in the heart of downtown St. Petersburg whereas The Return seemed to take place around the periphery of the city. There were seemingly more shots of huge apartment buildings, remants of buildings before the time of the Soviet Union - aristocratic buildings - , and crowded sidewalks than there were in The Return. In my opinion, the shots from The Return focused more on 'open space' and those from Brother focused more on 'crowded space'.

The mother in this film seemed very much like a working mom that had been left by her husband. She tried to be there for her boys - as evidenced by her running out to the dock to comfort Ivan - but she apparently was unable to raise them effectively (as was apparent by their extreme attitude problems). Upon the father's arrival, she appeared to be nervous and submissive. She accepted his word without question at the dinner table and when the boys ran home after fighting each other she nervously told them to be quiet - while she was smoking, which may have been due to nerves - because their father was sleeping. I was also immediately struck by the lack of possessions in the house. There were definitely the necessary items of furniture such as beds and tables, but there were no shots of televisions or personal effects of the boys or their mother. I felt that the house was barren to a degree that none of the other houses have been in movies that we have seen thus far.

I found myself thinking of the father as an extremely old-fashioned type of person. He was rough, serious, and controlling. To me, this seemed to be another instance of a man that obsessively felt the need to be in command of his family (which was strange considering that he had left them for a prolonged period of time). I would guess that he had probably had a difficult childhood or had served in the military. His stern tactics for raising his children seemingly had to have been learned from somewhere. Oddly, I felt that the father was a positive character. Ivan and Andrey both had serious character issues that needed to be ironed out. The father took the necessary measures in order to make them better people. Perhaps he dealt with them harshly, but we were seeing everything that was going on from the perspective of the two boys. He turned them from helpless, pouty, irresponsible little boys into young men by the time the movie was over.

Andrey seemed to idolize his father. He looked up to him for his strength and knowledge. Apparently, Andrey was desperate for a father figure in his life and he finally got the chance to have one. He definitely wanted to emulate his father. Andrey immediately started calling his father 'dad' and took orders from him without question. Whenever he talked back or did not stand up for himself his father disciplined him accordingly. Contrastingly, Ivan seemed to reject his father throughout the film. He was incredibly suspicious of him and did not trust him. When he could not get his way with his father he pouted. This tactic probably worked with his mother, but his father was not about to give into his son whenever his son became whiney. I found myself agreeing with the father's disiplinary tactics for Ivan as well (such as the time he left him outside by the road for a long period of time). Ivan needed to be shown that he would not always be able to get his way. The father also brought the brothers closer together. Apparently, they were not getting along too well at the beginning of the film. They got into fist fights and called each other names. However, by the end of the movie they were working together and seemingly enjoying each other's company.

I would say that we could never say without any doubt why the father came back or what he was trying to do on the trip. He was obviously attempting to retrieve something, but we never found out what that something was. Perhaps, that was one of the best aspects of this movie. I kind of liked not knowing for certain what the father was and what his intentions were. I would guess that he took his sons along in order to 'improve' them as much as he could. I felt as though he came home for whatever was in the box rather than to see his family again.

In my opinion, the title of this film was something of a paradox. The father made a return of sorts, but he certainly did not come back permanantly because he died. The boys also made a return trip home and came back as young men rather than little boys. Apparently, things would never return to the way that they once were. In some ways, I felt that this movie was a polar opposite of a return.