I’ve seen 12 Monkeys several times and each time I think the ending means something different. It’s been a little while since my last viewing, but I think the conclusion I came to was that the scientists (or whoever they are) don’t actually want to have a vaccine. I can’t recall why I thought they were continuing to send people into the past, but producing a vaccine would end their way of life, of being in charge. Something about the smug looks on their faces, I think, at the end, convinced me of this.
I will put this in a spoiler box so that it is your choice. I would recommend that you not spoil, and watch the series as it is excellent, but I leave the choice to you
DCI Sam Tyler is hit by a car and wakes up in the 1970’s. He has many experienjces in the past as he struggles to understand what has happened. He has occasional contact with the “real world” as doctors etc try to rouse him from his coma. The series culminates in him abandoning his friends and colleagues when they need him, and him waking up in a hospital room. However upon his return to his normal life, he is now disatisfied with it, and is unfeeling. He decides to return to his coma life and jumps off the top of a building. The ending has him returning to the coma life and turning his back on the real world, i.e. he commits suicide because he rpefers his fantasy to reality, which was a surprisin gthing to see shown on the Beeb I’ll tell you!
Life is Beautiful. Poor Roberto. I wanted a happy ending, silly me, to a concentration camp movie. For a movie with such comic moments, it was pretty grim. But I did love the little boy’s reaction to the tanks. “We won!” Bittersweet.
Hm. I thought about it and then went with reading the spoiler, and now I’m not sure how I feel about said spoiler. I think that I may go ahead and watch the show now either way, since it won’t be surprise enough to upset me when it happens. I’m pretty sure that I would have been upset and/or mad if I were invested in the show and that had happened without warning.
In Le Dîner de cons, the tax auditor is having a great time watching everyone else’s life crumbling around them. But he’s on top of his game. He’s sharp, he’s smart, he’s fast, he’s feared and he’s smug as hell. Then, in front of a group of people to whom he has been acting very superior, he learns over a speaker phone that the guy he’s been auditing for the past two years has been banging his wife the whole time. Fantastic moment. Surprising and hilarious.
Wilford Brimley in Absence of Malice. I never had much respect for him as an actor, but was completely stunned (pleasantly) when he entered the movie. Kind of a deus ex machina ending, but it was such a pleasure I forgave it for the opportunity to see him do a very respectable cameo.
Yeah, little bit. I was, what, maybe twelve? I was staying with some family friends while my parents were away for a few days…I was having a blast, because they actually had HBO! You could watch movies! And sometimes there were boobs!
Anyway, it was around 10 at night, and Friday The 13th was coming on. Man…an actual grown-up horror flick…not like those ones they show on The 4:30 Movie…one with blood and guts and everything! The kids of this family had an “Oh, this movie again?” attitude, and went to bed. But not me, no way, I was staying on that couch until the very end.
And what a sweet ending…Mrs. Voorhees was dead, and Alice was safe and sound floating in the middle of the lake, and OHSWEETMOTHEROFFUCKWHATTHEFUCKISTHAT?!?!?!?
As I recall, the family was none-to-pleased with my midnight shrieking.
[spoiler]George, a Parisian TV talk show host has been getting these mysterious videotapes of him and his family going about their daily lives. Eventually, as the tapes get stranger and stranger, clues are revealed the lead him to the home of of an Algerian man whose parents had worked for Georges’ parent when he was a little boy, and who had actually started to adopt him when his parents died. This man, Majid, denies making the tapes. Stranger and stranger things start happening, including, the disappearence of Pierrot, George’s 12-year-old son. George suspects Majid (and M’s son) of the kidnapping – no, Pierrot just spends the night at a friend’s house without telling anyone).
Eventually, after many vague hints, including suggestions that the Paris Massacre of '61 was related to this, Majid summons Georges to his apartment. But instead of explaining what’s going on, he suddenly grabs a knife and slits his own throat.[/spoiler]
The audience’s and my surprise at this was audible. The entire theatre gasped.
It was never revealed who was involved in all the funny business.
Smid and Zeldar, while I know the part you’re talking about (and need to review it for the details), of course, all indications would conclude that what we saw was the answer, what I meant to write was that it was never explicitly stated who had done it.
No quarrel there at all. And unless you’re a credits freak and don’t leave your seat (or turn off the DVD player) until the screen goes dark, you will miss it. It’s a bit annoying when filmmakers decide to leave their audience hanging so that the few who do wade through their tricks can brag on how subtle they are to the dismay of the more casual observers who are just pissed that it wasn’t clearer.
The thing that pushed me to find out was the genuine interest I had built up in the characters and the perplexing way the story was just dropped. It took a review (Ebert I suspect) to suggest going to the ending again. After I did that, and found “the answer” I was more than a little annoyed.
It’s like having to read the book after having invested $10 and an afternoon (something I’m about out of the habit of doing) or in a machine that allows you to play the scenes back in any order you choose (Hello, Memento!), in order to find out what it was you were seeing. My bet is that 1 out of 10 (maybe 20) feel that commitment to understanding a movie when maybe 1 in 100 movies demands that much of the viewer.
There is the thrill of the “Oh! I see!” moment, and some filmmakers tease you with the hope that there is one if you work for it. If they’re good about always having the answer there they continue to draw crowds (of whatever size their choices have limited the overall audience potential to) who relish the solving of the puzzle/mystery.
In this case, the answer is totally believable and ties up a few loose ends you didn’t realize were loose.
Smid and Zeldar, on second thought, I have to admit that the scene you were talking about was pretty conclusive.
I’m just such of a fan of up-in-the-air endings (Sopranos anyone), I was willfully clinging to what I wanted to take away from the movie (as well as relying on 'net synopses that backed that viewpoint up).
When Ray has the flashback to when he shoots the priest. After he shoots, the priest falls over and we see that a stray bullet has hit a little boy in the head.
