Movie Review: The Return (Vozvrashchenie)

So I've kind of been on a movie kick lately.  Action, horror, comedy, romance - I've been watching them all.  I have about 40 movies in my Netflix instant movie queue, and I've told myself that I'm not going to add any more until I've seen them all.  Which is kind of hard to do.

Anyway, I decided to review movies on this blog - in addition to adding recipes, obviously.  I'll try and do one a day, or one every few days; sometimes one blog post might have a few movie reviews.

The Return (Vozvrashchenie)

Don't ask me how to spell that in Russian, because I don't have a cyrillic keyboard and I'm too lazy to copy and paste :)  I was a little reluctant to watch this movie, partly because it's so long and partly because some of the reviews made it seem like it wouldn't be so good.  But I just decided to watch it anyway, and I'm glad I did.  Overall I'd give this movie 9 out of 10 stars.

This version of The Return is not, I repeat, not the movie of the same name that Sarah Michelle Gellar stars in.  It's a drama.  Now, the movie starts off fairly slow and it's pretty long: about an hour and fifty minutes.  It's basically about two boys who live in a pretty remote area with their mother and grandmother; their father disappeared 12 years ago and all the kids had to be reminded of him is a single photograph.  One day the father returns, without warning, and takes his sons on a trip to an isolated island.  The whole movie pretty much centers around the emotions that the kids feel when he comes back, and their struggling to accept him as their father.  Some people might have a problem with the movie because it's never mentioned why the father was gone for so long, but if you pay attention there should be no reason why you won't get that part.

The Return has a lot of scenes filmed in gorgeous areas, like the beach, the sea, and a forested area, and it rains a lot.  I mean, a lot.  The acting is really great, too, and the characters are believable.  The kids are really snotty in the beginning, the younger of the two the most; he whines all the time and refuses to do anything.  I kind of wanted to smack him a couple of times.  The ending of the movie was sort of unexpected, and I actually teared up a little.  If you ever decide to watch this movie, my only piece of advice is to make sure you have the subtitles on.

Swedish Visiting Cake

Ah, my first blog post.  This one is on Swedish visiting cake; I was in the mood to make some kind of homemade cake, and I found this recipe.  It's by no means a 'healthy' recipe - it has a whole stick of butter and a cup of sugar - but it's goooood.  And my version probably isn't too authentic, because I skipped adding the lemon zest and almond extract.

Ingredients:

• 1 cup sugar
• 2 large eggs
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1/2 tsp almond extract
• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 8 TBSP (1 stick) unsalted butter, melted and cooled
• 1/4 cup sliced almonds
• Grated zest of 1 lemon (I can't stand lemons, so I skipped this)

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Butter a 9 inch pan or a cupcake tin; set aside.  
2. Pour the sugar into a medium sized bowl.  Add the lemon zest and mix with your fingers until well combined (as I said earlier, I hate lemons and so I didn't add them).  Then, whisk in the eggs, one at a time, until well blended.  (Picture below is what it should look like - kind of gross D:)

3.  Whisk in salt and the extracts (I didn't have almond extract, so I added a tiny bit extra vanilla extract)
4. Switch to a rubber spatula and stir in the flour, about half a cup at a time.  At first it'll look like you added a ton of extra flour, but don't worry because it'll all come together.
5. Finally, fold in the melted butter.  The batter will become more runny.
6. Scrape the batter into the pan and smooth the top.  Sprinkle the almonds on top, followed by a little sprinkle of sugar over that. 
7. Bake for 25-30 minutes until the edges are golden brown and it looks done.  Remove it from the oven and cool for 5 minutes, then run a knife along the edges to loosen.  You can serve it warm or cold.  Oh, and it makes 8-10 servings.

Et voila!  You're done.  The center of the cake turned out to be really soft and moist, and the edges were crispy.  I think this was one of the best desserts (or breakfast I guess, if you pair it with some fruit) I've made in a long time, and I'll probably make it again.