On December 5, 2024, The Return offered a bold reinterpretation of the final chapters of Homer’s Odyssey. Rather than a mythic adventure filled with gods and monsters, director Uberto Pasolini crafts a somber meditation on the psychological toll of war.
A Bleak Homecoming
Forget the idyllic sunlit shores often associated with Ithaca. In The Return, there is no sun, no rain—only an oppressive grayness reminiscent of Scandinavian cinema, where inner turmoil overshadows the physical landscape.
A weary, broken Odysseus—played with quiet intensity by Ralph Fiennes—finally arrives home after twenty years. He is no longer a conquering hero but a man hollowed out by loss, his journey more psychological than physical. Gone are the Cyclops, the Sirens, and the vengeful gods. The real battle is not with mythical creatures but with time, absence, and the erosion of identity.
Ithaca is unrecognizable. Penelope, played by Juliette Binoche in a stunningly restrained performance, has spent two decades trapped in a slow, silent war of endurance. Her home has been overrun by suitors, men who have feasted on her wealth while pressuring her to remarry. Her son, Telemachus, has grown up weak and ineffectual, powerless against the men who mock him.
Odysseus watches all of this unfold, an outsider in his own kingdom.
Penelope’s Quiet Strength
Unlike many adaptations of The Odyssey, The Return places Penelope at the emotional core of the story. Binoche delivers a masterclass in controlled grief, playing a woman who has spent twenty years unraveling and reweaving the same tapestry—both literally and metaphorically. She asks questions that have no satisfying answers:
“Why do men go to war?”
“So many years… why?”
Odysseus, a man who has endured horrors beyond words, has no response. His silence speaks volumes.
Blood in the Palace
When Odysseus finally acts, it is with brutal efficiency. The slaughter of the suitors is inevitable—merciless, methodical, and deeply unsettling. Unlike in Homer’s epic, there is no glory here. Blood stains the walls, the floors, the very foundations of the home Penelope fought so hard to preserve. Telemachus, covered in gore, stands beside his father, no longer a boy but not yet a man.
In Homer’s version, even the palace’s enslaved women—those forced into relations with the suitors—are executed. Pasolini spares the audience this particular horror, but the weight of the violence is still suffocating.
And in the end, Penelope does not rush into her husband’s arms. She simply stares, horrified.
A Film of Subtle Devastation
Unlike traditional retellings of The Odyssey, The Return does not offer triumphant closure. Instead, it lingers in that terrible in-between space—where victory is indistinguishable from loss, and home is no longer home.
Fiennes and Binoche, whose on-screen chemistry dates back to The English Patient, deliver performances steeped in restraint and sorrow. They do not lean on mythology to elevate their roles; they exist as real, fragile humans navigating an impossible situation.
Shot on the island of Corfu, the Peloponnesian coast, and the Etruscan necropolis near Rome, the film captures a world both hauntingly ancient and painfully relevant.
For those expecting a faithful Homeric epic, The Return may feel like a departure. But for those willing to sit with its quiet devastation, it is a deeply affecting portrait of war’s true cost—not just on the battlefield, but in the homes left behind.
Watch The Return on eBravoapp.com.