The last time Ralph Fiennes and Juliette Binoche shared a movie screen, in “The English Patient” (1996), he was a severely singed explorer and she was his sexy nurse. He is in somewhat better shape as Odysseus, the haggard, haunted heart of “The Return,” Uberto Pasolini’s take on the final section of Homer’s “The Odyssey.”
An austere, pained drama about postwar trauma and survivor guilt, “The Return” reduces ancient myth to its psychological studs. Twenty years have passed since Odysseus left Ithaca to fight the long-ended Trojan War, his whereabouts since a mystery. (In this telling, the only gods and monsters are in Odysseus’s troubled mind.) Shipwrecked on the shore and taken for the beggar he now resembles, Odysseus finds his kingdom in ruins and his wife, Penelope (Binoche), hounded by a swarm of squabbling suitors. Even his son, Telemachus (Charlie Plummer), is urging his mother to remarry and ensure their safety.
Less an epic poem than a showcase for two of cinema’s finest actors, “The Return” is visually bleak and emotionally gripping. Many scenes play out in candlelight and leaping shadows, with Marius Panduru’s camera crawling close to seamed faces and veined forearms. And while Marwan Kenzari deserves special mention for his quietly powerful turn as the most genuine of Penelope’s hopefuls, Fiennes leaves them all in the dust. In his early 60s, his body is a marvel, hard and sinewy and believably battle-scarred.
“For some, a war becomes home,” he says at one point, his line readings so pungent you’ll barely miss the excitement of a Cyclops or a Calypso. Binoche has less to say, but her eyes and hands convey more agony and bitterness than an entire page of dialogue. When there’s precious little scenery to chew, the best actors know their words have to be enough.
The ReturnRated R for a glimpse of penis and a gush of blood. Running time: 1 hour 56 minutes. In theaters.casino slots online