The Return (2024)

Plot of The Return: A naked man is washed up on the beach of a Greek island and is rescued by a farmer. He gradually gains strength and learns that the island is Ithaca. Meanwhile in the castle, a hilltop fort with, it seems, no windows Penelope, Ulysses’s wife is being besieged by suitors and defended by Telemachus, her son.  She agrees that then she has finished weaving a funeral shroud for her father, she will marry one of the suitors, but in the night she undoes the work she has done the previous day. The suitors try to get Telemachus to help them, but he refuses, putting his life in danger. Ulysses tries to make himself known to his son, and pretending to be an old soldier begs for food from the suitors. His dog recognises him but dies immediately. One of the suitors finds out what Penelope is doing with the weaving so she agrees that on the following day she will choose someone. The scene is set. The suitors are given the task of stringing Ulysses’s bow and shooting an arrow through a line of axe heads. Who will do it?

Content: Much is made of the fact that Ralph Fiennes appears full frontally naked in an early scene. Walking through a dark corridor of the castle Penelope sees suitors having sex with young women, with flashes of nudity. Ulysses is washed up on the beach. He lives in a shack and sometimes mends the roof. The suitors camp on an area of sand outside the walls of the castle. Penelope, inside the castle, weaves during the day, and undoes her work at night, all of it in semi-darkness. Everybody looks poor and distressed, clad in a few bits of cloth, except for Penelope who is well dressed. At one point Ulysses and his son and his rescuer are chased by the suitors with dogs.

A View: I could hardly contain myself after watching this outing, together with about twenty others. I admit I did drop off for a bit, and the man in the row behind me snored for most of the film. I am not actually sure that the hero identified himself, but since in Spain it is called ‘The Return of Ulysses’, that would not be a problem. I think it was an ill-conceived project. By stripping out the mysticism, and replacing it with realism, any fun that might be had in the story is lost. Heavens, the suitors were making free with the hospitality of the palace, not grovelling in the sand outside the walls, and (a bit of a spoiler) what about the handmaids? So, in my view, despite earnest intentions, it is not a watch, even for nothing. But, actually, your granny might like it.

Fun Fact: Most of it was filmed on Corfu and the castle was somewhere in the Peloponnese.