I take issue with the notion that the twist ending of The Crying Game is “most of the movie.” Yeah, it’s a rather major reversal, so that’s what most people talk about, but Neil Jordan is generally a smarter filmmaker than that (that idiotic Annette Bening serial killer / psychic thing notwithstanding); he wouldn’t do the movie simply to screw with the audience’s head. To a lesser extent, you can say the same about The Sixth Sense – the second time through, it’s a rather touching examination of loss and forgiveness.
Speaking of which, I had seen it and enjoyed it in the cinema, and was trying to convince my wife to see it. “It isn’t that scary,” I said. I almost had her convinced, and then we saw an episode of something – can’t remember what; “Daily Show,” “Saturday Night Live,” whatever – where Nathan Lane did a series of take-offs on scenes from the movie. Finally, in the last one, he turned to the camera and brayed, “And at the end, he’s a ghost! Who knew?” and slapped his forehead comically. My wife turned to me and said, “Really?” and I stalked off, royally pissed.
I actually do this to mess with people, except I make up plot twists that aren’t actually in the book or movie or whatever. “Have you gotten to the part where Samwise steals the ring and kills Frodo?”
Generally, yes, but the recent Memento is a big exception. I knew in advance there’d be a mindblower of a climax (and because the movie’s still in release, don’t anybody actuall give it away here, either), and I’m usually pretty good at figuring these things out – but I literally had no clue until it actually unfolded.
I’ve always wanted to make a parody in which the camera tracks in over Xanadu, in through the window, up into Charles Foster Kane’s bedroom, up onto the bed, close in on Kane’s lips, and he suddenly says: Flexible Flyer
And the movie ends right there.
Unfortunately, even fewer kids today would get the joke (how many years has it been since Flexible Flyer sold a sled?) than have seen Citizen Kane.
Am I missing something? What scene where the doc and the mom are talking? The doc talks “at” other characters throughout the film, and there is often the appearance of other characters being aware of him (such as when he and the mom are sitting in the living room when the kid comes home from school. They’re sitting there “looking at” each other, and it seems as though they’ve been waiting together, perhaps chatting, but they never exchange words and the mother never acknowledges him) In actuality Willis only has interactive dialogue with the boy. IIRC, that’s one of the “clues” that he’s dead. Only the kid can see him and talk to him.
I think Goboy is talking about the other scene with the mom and a doctor. When she takes the boy to the hospital and they think she’s been beating him. The mom and the emergency room doctor talk for almost a minute while Wilis’s character paces in the background. I thought it was odd that he wasn’t speaking up during that scene, ut the ending still surprised me.
With a movie like “The Sixth Sense,” I believe you have two distinct camps. Science Fiction/mystery/Shaggy Dog-loving fans like myself, who have read in these genres for over thirty years, who is used to the masters like Charles Beaumont and Richard Matheson and Frederic Brown and Robert Sheckley and (second-hand) Rod Serling, etc., etc., etc. Compared to these guys Shamylan (sp.) is a punk kid who ought to know better than to try to pull that old chestnut. Sorry, but it was painfully obvious from the BANG of the gun to me. The other camp are folks whose literary tastes do not run to this type of material.
And I’m not saying that I’m smarter, faster in any way other than the fact that I’m well-read in this niche of storytelling.
“No Way Out” got me though, sucked me right in, and fooled me. We all get taken, I just wish it was more often. Sometimes I lose sight of movies sitting there trying to out-think them.
When I went to see Sixth Sense, I had no idea that there was a surprise ending. All I had heard was that there was a scary movie with a good ending. Consequently, I was floored when it was revealed. I had no idea what was coming. And it was a great experience, I have to say.
BTW, thank you to the girl who went with me for NOT giving it away!
Forgot the one that surprised me the most–“Fallen”–now that was well done–and what a great final line (of narration), and with three superb actors like Denzel Washington, John Goodman and Donald Sutherland, even I will turn off my trick-ending radar and enjoy the movie.
I’m a great fool for spoilers. It just doesn’t dawn on me. In French Lit as Film class I was talking to guy and we had both finished Madame Bovary and I asked him what he though when Emma swallowed the arsenic. Several people in the class went “WHAT!!!” um … uh … um … uh
Then there’s all those Cristmas and birthday times. “Hey, what happened to the rubber Duckies?”
Although on the reverse I knew the ending of 6th Sense and Planet of the Apes and Soylent Green. I got to watch Memento in a Film Festival before it came out so nobody was talking about it yet. But in general I think that trailers give away too much. I like to go into a movie cold. Which is why I usually go to a film on opening day.
You forgot the episode where Homer gets to ride on the space shuttle and at the press conference where he’s shown to the media says: “I just hope they don’t send me to that horrible planet of the apes. Wait a minute! That was the Earth! Damn you! God damn you all to hell!”
well more my son after seeing the recent Rise of the Planet of the Apes said to me that he was really wished he didn’t know the ending of the original Planet of the Apes. And i have to agree. I saw the movie as a young teen and that iconic moment when Heston jumps off the horse and you are looking down at he and Nova through some twisted hunk of metal and he screaming “you did it! You finally did it” then we pull back and see half buried in the beach the statue of liberty…my god I don’t think any movie ending ever hit me as hard as that one did… I feel bad that he had to watch it knowing from some tv show where the ending was revealed
This is actually the subject of the worst spoiler I’ve ever seen. When the lame Tim Burton Planet of the Apes movie came out, they re-released a new version of the original film on DVD. The cover-art on the DVD case had a big picture of the destroyed statue of liberty. They spoiled the end of the movie on the DVD case! They mind as well put the Skywalker family tree on the cover of Episode IV.
The second worst was Sum of all Fears. It wasn’t a very good movie in anycase, but I think it would’ve been at least a decent movie if they didn’t reveal what would’ve been a pretty surprising and shocking plot point in the trailer.
On an episode of The Office, Michael Scott, distressed over the death of a bird, has a bereavement session where he asks everyone to tell something about the death of someone close.
Pam tells the storyline of Million Dollar Baby as if it were someone she knew. Since I hadn’t seen it yet, it blew the ending for me.
I never got to know whether or not the twist of The Sixth Sense would have fooled me or not. Nathan Lane spoiled it for me on Letterman while the film was still playing in first run. Bastard!
A review I read of Close Encounters of the Third Kind spoiled the destination for the landing of the spaceship. I’d been to that place, and would have liked to figure out the spot for myself. In hindsight the clues were pretty obvious, but still.
Funny thing is, Shultz also spoiled the ending of Citizen Kane for me, but it wasn’t that same strip. It was another one where Snoopy had a sled, and Charlie Brown looked at and noticed the sled was named Rosebud. I didn’t get the joke as a kid, but it stuck in my mind, and when I finally saw Citizen Kane well afterwards, it made me realize quickly what Rosebud was.
Curse you, Sparky! Thankfully though, Citizen Kane is still an incredibly enjoyable film, even if you know the ‘twist’.
