Green water ripples like a kaleidoscope, accompanied by a low, raspy melody that hints at the ocean's hidden secret. So begins Andrey Zvyagintsev’s The Return. Below the surface, the camera navigates the desolate seabed, revealing ancient coral reefs before settling on a sunken rowboat, its prow tied with a rope. Underwater, the boat is no longer visible to the world, yet the rope suggests its reachable presence, akin to the knowledge of God through faith. Built around days of the week, the film starts on Sunday, the weekly memorial of Jesus’s Resurrection. Two brothers, Andrei (14) and Ivan (12), alongside their friends, challenge each other to leap into the sea from a diving board. In an overhead shot, the two siblings stand on the board, their presence diminished by the vast ocean. Andrei follows suit, but Ivan steps back, fearing heights and the water suggestive of God. Likewise, when their father returns home after 12 years, the two brothers respond differently: Andrei is accepting while Ivan is skeptical, if not fearful, of this stranger’s appearance. So for Ivan, part of growing up is to come to terms with the unknown, whether the father, the ocean, or God.
Mantegna, Lamentation over the Dead Christ, ca. 1483; Brera Gallery, Milan. Flickr, by Richard Mortel (2019).
In fact, the father is like God, appearing out of nowhere. When the mother announces the news, she simply says, “Your father’s sleeping,” as if his existence does not need to be confirmed. When Andrei gently pushes the door open, the two brothers see their father lying on the bed with the sheet covering him from the waist down, his head slightly tilted, similar to Andrea Mantegna’s The Lamentation over the Dead Christ. Andrei, like the mourners in the painting, is close to tears as Ivan hastily searches the attic, sifting through a dusty box. He discovers an illustrated Bible concealing an old photograph of his father. A close-up shot juxtaposes the foreground family photo with the sacrifice of Isaac, Ivan’s doubt overpowering faith. At dinner, after asking the mother to pour the brothers some wine, the father proposes a fishing trip with his sons. The Ichthys standing for “Jesus Christ, Son of God, Our Savior” in ancient Greek further highlights the father’s God-like presence.
Church of the Most Holy Rosary, Tullow, County Carlow, Ireland. Wikimedia Commons, by Andreas F. Borchert (2013).
But the father, from forcing Ivan to call him “Dad” to engaging in street justice, is like Matthew’s Jesus, a violent revolutionary who supposes, “I have not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come to set a man against his father (Matthew 10:34-36).” Without faith, Ivan is like the doubting Thomas who questions his father’s past and intentions. On the first night, Andrei and Ivan lie side by side in the tent. Andrei has his eyes closed when the still-awake Ivan initiates a conversation about their father's remark that he once had too many fish. “Where could that have happened?” Ivan asks. Andrei nonchalantly responds, “In the north, maybe.” Ivan shrugs off Andrei’s elbow as if to shake off his brother's faith. “He’s just lying,” Ivan concludes. “He could be a gangster. He could slit our throats.” As the father becomes more abusive and authoritarian, Ivan, in the next tent scene, promises that he will kill their father if he touches him. The frustrated Ivan then opens the journal and writes down his promise, foreshadowing its happening. Next to him, Andrei, head down, can only watch with concern like a helpless disciple.
The Incredulity of Saint Thomas. Wikimedia Commons, by Sailko (2016).
In a fight with his father, Ivan, holding a knife, cries, “I could love you if you were different, but you’re terrible.” The father tries to approach and reason, but Ivan drops the knife and runs away. He climbs up to a watchtower and threatens to jump down if the father follows him. Close to executing his unrealized jump, Ivan, however, witnesses his father's fatal fall from the ladder. Echoing the diving scene, the film shows an overhead shot of the dead father on the ground, with a fallen log beside him. The doubting Thomas finally senses Jesus’s wounds. In the end, the two brothers witness their father's body descending into the ocean, along with all the rights and wrongs. The identity of the father, whether perceived as God or the Devil, becomes inconsequential when Ivan calls out, “Dad,” finally conquering his fear or lack of faith. But this achievement is not a result of taking a heroic leap but of enduring the agony that defines the adult world.
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