No jokey “This main character was so stupid I was horrified the other actors didn’t throw them over a cliff” type responses, please. I am talking about finales that jerk the rug out from under you emotionally, that let you know in no uncertain terms that any and all hope you had for good to somehow win out was false.
I have one in mind, but I will let others go first because I am pretty sure someone will mention it within ten posts.
And please-No Lists, either pulled from another website or home made. Just give us your single most horrifying movie finale if you can.
Se7en is what immediately springs to mind. I’ll come back if I think of any others.
Grave of the Fireflies?
Don’t recall the chronology of Dear Zachary, but I think it probably doesn’t quite qualify.
Again, not really looking for a list. Just the one finale that horrified you the most, please.
In The Last American Virgin, the main character is sweet on a girl who starts dating another guy, gets pregnant, and they he dumps her. Our protagonist ends up selling most of his worldly possessions, including his prized stereo, and borrowed money to pay for an abortion. They spend the next week together, he confesses his love, they share a tender moment, and she invites him to her 18th birthday party. Dude scrapes together some money to get her a gold locket, and when he shows up to the party he finds her making out with the guy who dumped her after she got pregnant. The movie ends with him driving away with tears streaming down his face.
The ending was such a gut punch and probably the only reason anyone remembers this movie at all. And while not a horror film, I’m using the definition as given by the OP “finales that jerk the rug out from under you emotionally, that let you know in no uncertain terms that any and all hope you had for good to somehow win out was false.”
It’s an older movie so I’m not going to spoiler it: Gallipoli
Okay, if that’s what you need… okay, I’ll only post one:
The Cabin in the Woods.
It doesn’t have to be, as you have just shown.
Sorry for ruining your thread.
Thread is doing fine.
ETA: never mind, don’t want to ruin the movie for someone else. It wasn’t quite what Czarcasm was asking for, anyway.
Breaking News in Yuba County
This was billed as a dark comedy. We like dark comedies! Comedies don’t have to be simple or wholesome! But the movie just kept on getting darker and darker, and by the (insanely gory) end, I was ready to write a strongly worded letter to the editor, or to whoever at Netflix was in charge of movie descriptions.
“Let Me In” more sad than horrifying really.
But it wasn’t until the end credits that it dawned on me that I was rooting for the villain to win.
Good one!
For me, it was The Mist, even more so having first read the story.
A Serbian Film has an ending so horrific that I probably can’t even describe it without violating a board rule. Look it up on Wikipedia if you really want to know.
It seems kind of lame and predictable in hindsight, but when I saw it in the theater as a 15 year old, the end of the 1978 version of Invasion of the Body Snatchers had that effect on me.
This was going to be my suggestion.
Mine too.
This is the only movie ending that managed to break my heart, and make me feel depressed AND furious at the same time.
Being John Malkovich - he’s finally free for a few seconds, and then that horde of body-snatching monsters crawls into his head and seizes control of his life, forever.
Requiem for a Dream.