The Return (2003)
Directed by Andrey Zvyagintsev
Two young brothers in contemporary Russia are reunited with a father they know only from an old photograph after his sudden return from a long absence. With their mother’s reluctant consent, they set out on a remote trip that quickly becomes an uneasy test of authority, trust, and masculinity. As the journey moves deeper into the wilderness, the fragile bonds between father and sons are pushed to their limits.
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What critics compared The Return to
Leviathan is the fourth feature from 50-year-old filmmaker Andrey Zvyagintsev (The Return, Elena), a director whose fondness for long takes and spiritual themes has often drawn comparisons to the late Russian master Andrei Tarkovsky.
Yet Leviathan, the latest movie from auteur Andrey Zvyagintsev (The Return, Elena), won Best Screenplay at Cannes and is Russia’s entry for Best Foreign-Language Film at the 87th Academy Awards.
Written and directed by Andrey Zvyagintsev (The Return, Elena), the film concerns a man named Kolya who lives in a small coastal town on the Barents Sea, who wants to save his home from an eminent-domain-like seizure by the local mayor.
Director Zvyagintsev (2003’s The Return) paints with a mammoth canvas but chooses to focus on the travails of one fragile family: father Kolya (Serebryakov), his wife Lilya (Liadova), and his rebellious son Roma (Pokhodaev) from a previous marriage.
For Russian writer-director Zvyagintsev, whose 2003 debut The Return deeply impressed, this is feature number four, though only his second to be seen here outside festivals.
Andrey Zvyagintsev, who has intimately dissected the human toll of post-communist boom and bust cycles in “Elena” and “The Return,” connects personal conflict with public corruption like nobody’s business in this seemingly unpromising tale of a property dispute in a small seaside town.