I am terrible at remembering how movies end, especially if the ending is generally happy. Shocking or twist endings tend to stick in my mind better.
One that totally floored me and stuck with me for awhile was The Grifters with John Cusack and Anjelica Huston:
I can’t remember exactly how it happens, (someone throws something at him?) Cusack is drinking something (or someone throws the glass at him?), the glass breaks and cuts his juglular vein and he DIES!!! Right in front of Anjelica Huston who is his mother! She does nothing to help him, leaves him dying on the floor and drives off. Oh, how that ending absolutely stunned me!!
What are some other totally shocking and stunning movie endings?
The Others took me completely by surprise – and I usually figure out how a movie is going to end ten minutes into it! Another great one is Strange Days when
Mace and Lenny split up at the end. I was shrieking at the TV screen, “You dufus, she’s so obviously in love with your stupid ass!” Then Lenny goes back for her, and all is right with the world.
So we ever really know for CERTAIN that he is Kayser Soze?
Places in the Heart:
This one is my favorite ending for a movie. The scene is a Communion service in a church. Characters begin to pass the Communion plate to each other. You see enemies sitting next to each other. Then you realize that you are also seeing people who have been killed in the movie. There is no explanation given, but it surely made me feel great!
The only other survivor of the assault on the ship (the burnt Hungarian guy who kept screaming “Keyser Soze”) was able to describe Keyser’s appearance to a police sketch artist. When the drawing of Keyser Soze was faxed to the station house where Verbal was being interrogated, it was revealed that the face on the drawing was that of Verbal.
-I’ll second the Pledge…i don’t think i’ll ever that depressed after a movie ends…
-I’ll also second 7even, the day after i saw the movie i was furious, i couldn’t come to grip with how cruel the ending, i was literally beside myself.
Little Kevin wakes up to find the whole thing was just a dream and then…
“Mum, Dad – don’t touch it! It’s EVIL!” His parents then explode and the fireman who rescued him turns out to be Sean Connory, who was King Agamemnon in Kevin’s “dream.” The film ends with Kevin all alone looking around lost and forelorn.
I was young when I saw the film, and that scene really left me very disturbed at the end of an otherwise funny, uplifting movie. Terry Gilliam is one seriously disturbed guy…
I saw the original Planet of the Apes when I was about 8 years old, and that ending totally blew me away.
I think it was Rod Serling who conceived of that ending, and it was pure genius.
Count me as one of the people most decidedly not surprised by the ending of 7even. It’s an effective ending, granted, but I saw it coming a mile away. Especially with the heavy foreshadowing given by John Doe (Spacey’s character --> he didn’t have a name, did he?) on the ride there. Effective, yes, surprising, no.
I think we need spoilers, since someone who is interested in these kind of movies (who, me?), but hasn’t seen that particular movie would not be pleasantly surprised to see the real surprise spoiled beforehand.
That said, I agree with yours, Peg.
And I’m completely with those who saw the ending of Se7en coming up real soon, what with
all the attention to paid to the family situation of Brad Pitt’s character.
