The Return: The Legacy of a Prodigal Father

The Return is a Russian film about two boys who have only known the world of the mothers, having been raised exclusively by their loving and protective mother and grandmother. Their life takes a different course when the father they have never known unexpectedly resurfaces after a twelve-year absence and takes them on a fishing trip into the Russian wilderness. What is that has driven the father to take his sons on such a venture? And why did he return?

The Director, Andrei Zvyagintsev, has said of his film “...if it wasn’t steeped in religious and mythological references, it wouldn’t have depth.” What are these references, and what is the archetypal drama he has tapped into? He has also offered that it “is about the metaphysical incarnation of the soul’s movement from the mother to the father.”