Well, to be fair, sturmhauke, that wasn’t an ending so much as a middle.
There’s one that I thought would be fairly obvious that’s been missed -
Pink Flamingos! Utterly without redemption. In fact, the protagonists / antagonists of this film compete for the title of most ruthlessly craven, irredeemable filthy person in the world.
OTOH, stick to your guns and you have a decent shot at writing reviews for freebee papers in small cities. Make sure you sneer about Art a lot.
Nonsense. Anyone can name dozens without breaking a sweat. What SHOULD be impossible is tacking on a pessimistic, sad ending when one isn’t required.
The Last Seduction
My breath is bated.
As I pointed out above, with multiple examples, a redemptive movie does not require a happy ending. So this:
…is pompous bullshit.
Worded like this, True Romance would qualify. Two reasonably normal people go batshit crazy after meeting each other, leaving a trail of bodies across the country. Some intentionally, some not, but the guy’s own father gets added to the bodycount, and they never give him a second thought. After a dozen people get gunned down during the final deal, they take off to Mexico, with no lesson learned other than “You’re so cool.” No return to normal life, no consequences for all the murder, and no recogniztion of the error of their ways. Still, most would consider it a happy ending.
Just off the top of my head in a minute’s time:
The Usual Suspects
Memento
Identity
Easy Rider
Se7en
Arlington Road
Confessions of a Dangerous Mind
If you weren’t so inexplicably angry, we might discuss the differences between a “redemptive movie,” and “redemptive elements,” and a “happy ending,” and may try to understand what each of us means by these terms. But for some reason I still cannot fathom you’re obviously not remotely interested in engaging in an actual discussion, only in reacting angrily to what you think I’ve said. We might even be able to discuss the movies you offered for examples as a way of understanding what each of us sees in those, and other movies, that is relevant to this discussion.
Arlington Road, possibly? The ending, with Jeff Bridges’ character getting killed and then posthumously blamed for all the crap that Tim Robbins had been pulling all along is monumentally unfair. But such things happen.
The Usual Suspects – good example. I’d say the “Dark Comedy” category is the obvious fly in the OP’s ointment. And while TUS is not, per se, a dark comedy, the ending has a distinct dark-comedy twist to it.
Memento — Well, as I assume you know I know, judging from the movies I have defended around here, and from my first post in this thread, of course there are thousands of movies that are not “morally redemptive,” to use the OP’s terminology. But the way the OP was framed led me to believe that he was asking in the context of Major Hollywood Blockbusters. I mean, the question itself suggests that, because, well, there *are *thousands of such movies. Memento is one of thousands of non-redemptive, non-Hollywood non-blockbusters.
Identity – ditto
Easy Rider – ditto
Se7en – dark, but comeuppance happens.
Arlington Road – do terrible movies count?
Confessions of a Dangerous Mind – again, certainly not the kind of movie the OP seemed to be asking about.
Not exactly sure what we’re arguing about. From my posts it’s obvious that I’m more a fan of “non-redemptive” movies than I am of artificially redemptive movies (hell, where’s *Showgirls *on your list?), so my “no it’s not possible” was obviously, A), flippant, and B), limited to the context of the OP, which seemed to be about Hollywood Product. If the OP is, however, actually opened up to All Movies Ever Made Anywhere, then it becomes nonsensical.
With that in mind, assuming we agree, I can’t think of a movie that would fit in with my reading of the OP–Hollwood blockbuster–that didn’t follow the formula. Which, again, may be more true-Scotsman stuff.
I find arrogance annoying. I’m funny that way.
Depending on who you ask, The End of Evangelion may or may not have a non-redemptive, forced tragic ending.
Then again, that whole movie sort of defies explanation, so…
War of the Roses has no redemption, though they did have to neutralize a scene which implied Kathleen Turner had killed Michael Douglas’ dog.
I don’t recall any redemption in Basic Instinct, either, or maybe the plot was just too incoherent.
As for an ending that was redemptive but not happy, Star Trek II: TWOK is way up there.
Spoke, just stop it. Please read my post again with an effort to understand what I was saying, rather than what you have mistakenly assumed. I was talking about Hollywood history, and I was being arrogant or insulting to exactly no one in this thread. The targets of my “arrogance” were Walt Disney, Stephen Spielberg, and the Catholic Church. You have absolutely zero right to entirely derail this whole discussion because you have personally manufactured “arrogance” where there was none. YOU took an interesting discussion and introduced sarcasm and insult where there was none–NONE–before. If you are going to absolutely refuse to return the focus to the actual subject at hand, rather than your assumptions about what I was thinking when I wrote my post, then just tell me now and I’ll leave this thread entirely alone.
So anyone who doesn’t embrace the grim nihilism of Dancer in the Dark must be “emotionally immature” and capable of appreciating nothing more emotionally complex than Spielberg.
Oh no, lissener, that’s not arrogant at all.
(emphasis added)
And then there’s this:
Condescending and simplistic. A charming combination.
Would you agree now (after we have held your hand and showed you examples) that a movie can have redemption and still no “Disney ending?”
To avoid some confusion, I’ll color my interjections.
You’re conflating what the OP asked and what YOU asked. YOU asked if a non-happy ending were possible in Hollywood and cynically concluded “no.”
Easy Rider and Electra glide in Blue. They are definately not the ending expected.