The Unknown

The Return is a fantastic film. It has a great plot, the speed of the film is good, and the cinematography is great. There are a lot of Tarkovsky visual quotes in this film, for example, the dripping water, lakes in general, fire, mirrors, wind, and the cinematography. The film starts with a shot of the water, which is how the father eventually disappears. Many shots are shown through the point of view of Ivan. When Ivan is looking through the binoculars, the camera shakes as if we are the ones holding the binoculars. As I mentioned, the father eventually sinks into the water, but I felt that throughout this film, the father is represented by rainstorms. The rainstorms start once he arrives and the last one we hear starting is when the boys drive away from where the father sank. I feel that this is symbolic of how the father was just a burden on the family and was preventing them from being complete.
The film overall is very anxiety inducing and leaves you uncomfortable in your seat, waiting for something bad to happen. The film starts off with kids jumping off of a tower into a lake. One kid, Ivan, is to scared to jump off and we see him stay up there until his mother comes to get him and take him home. This is the start of the anxiety. The climax of the story is when the father dies. When I watched this scene I jumped. I was not expecting that to happen. I was preparing for Ivan to jump and die, but the father came out of nowhere and fell. I was surprised at how mature both of the boys instantly became.
The father was an overall negative force in this film. At points it was obvious that he cared for the two boys, but overall he did not know how to show it and he ended up just slowly torturing them. I think that the mother also cared greatly for her sons.
I think that one very important part of this film is the music. Though not always present, it always brought a sense of unease and it really helped set the tone of the film. The film starts off with somber music that somehow sounds very aquatic to me. There is an overall theme tune in the film. In the climax of the film, when the boys are bringing back their father in the boat, the sound of water rushing, a loud motor, and very intense music are overlapping and create a very intense setting. As well as this scene, there is times when the music imitates a heart beat, and I found my heart to be beating at the same pace as the music.
I also like how the movie ends with the pictures that the brothers took while on their trip and then go into the pictures of them as kids with their mother. The ending is left up to imagination, on a cliffhanger.
Overall this film was brilliant and I can't wait to make my friends and family watch it with me.