Abrupt movie endings.

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Somebody mentioned liking the ending of Birdy in the Vietnam thread and it reminded me that it's one of the best 'abrupt' endings of all time.

Closing on a mood, a moment or a cinematic punchline seems to sum up some films better than a drawn out epilogue ever could.

Some other examples include They Live, American Werewolf in London (my personal favorite), and Reservoir Dogs.

― PVC (peeveecee), Tuesday, 13 May 2003 20:08 (twenty-two years ago)

And -- Eyes Wide Shut?

― PVC (peeveecee), Tuesday, 13 May 2003 20:11 (twenty-two years ago)

Well it's interesting how in different genres there are certain things--the narrative, in the camera style, in the editing, in the music, even in the lighting if you're talking about formula TV--that signify "THE END" and it can be very jolting if you consciously (or even accidentally) leave such a signifier out. I'm torn between finding Endings maudlin and realizing that they are in general a necessary part of the aesthetic experience. An ending that is either impressive in itself or succesfully winds down or restates concerns of the film is probably a necessary component of storytelling. The films that stand out for avoiding this, well, they stand out precisely because there is a norm to violate. If all films did this I think we'd be impoverished.

Preminger's Angel Face has one of the most astonishingly abrupt endings of any Hollywood film I know, even as it makes sense in retrospect. (P.S. You need to see this.)

Another example is Two Lane Blacktop which seems to end not because anything has been resolved, but because going any further would simply involve a restatement of themes and ideas that have already been exhibited (a very minimalist gesture). At the same time, the ending does have a kind of drama even if its a drama we're conditioned to accept as such only thanks to modernism. Likewise Antonioni's films were seen to have abrupt endings in their day but now they seem totally appropriate, even sentimental.

Even more distubring than "abrupt" endings of that sort are films whose ending seems arbitrary, as if the narrative was simply clipped at one of many possible pauses. Hou's Flowers of Shanghai feels like this, and I haven't yet decided if the ending occurs after a logical denouement or not.

― amateurist (amateurist), Tuesday, 13 May 2003 20:55 (twenty-two years ago)

Haha, "Monty Python & the Holy Grail" owns you all. I still remember the total confusion I felt when it ended when I saw it for the first time, like, "is that it???"

― Pashmina (Pashmina), Tuesday, 13 May 2003 21:41 (twenty-two years ago)

i was convinced a reel was missing at the end of Boiler Room, but i was too relieved it was over to complain

― jones (actual), Tuesday, 13 May 2003 21:44 (twenty-two years ago)

What about fake-out endings? Action films do this so much it's not even really a fake-out anymore (see Red Dragon), but this is kind of interesting too. I wish I could think of some examples.

― slutsky (slutsky), Tuesday, 13 May 2003 21:45 (twenty-two years ago)

you mean "the villain is dead but OH NO HE ISN'T" endings? yes those are standard-issue now i think

― jones (actual), Tuesday, 13 May 2003 21:49 (twenty-two years ago)

Didn't DIE HARD have a fake-out ending. You mean, like, where you think it's over and then a bad guy comes running out with a gun and then someone who hasn't had the privelage of killing yet blows them away, right?

― PVC (peeveecee), Tuesday, 13 May 2003 21:52 (twenty-two years ago)

jones -- yeah exactly.

― PVC (peeveecee), Tuesday, 13 May 2003 21:52 (twenty-two years ago)

I hate those.

― PVC (peeveecee), Tuesday, 13 May 2003 21:53 (twenty-two years ago)

Almost as much as I hate the old 'knife in the leg' bit.

― PVC (peeveecee), Tuesday, 13 May 2003 21:53 (twenty-two years ago)

'Well it's interesting how in different genres there are certain things--the narrative, in the camera style, in the editing, in the music, even in the lighting if you're talking about formula TV--that signify "THE END"'

Like the crane shot or the 'poetic' voice over (Road To Perdition had a particularly annoying use of this).

― PVC (peeveecee), Tuesday, 13 May 2003 21:56 (twenty-two years ago)

Eric Rohmer's La Collectioneuse (sp?) has a fantastic abrupt ending too.

― PVC (peeveecee), Tuesday, 13 May 2003 22:01 (twenty-two years ago)

Vertigo!

Also Chabrol's Les cousins (he learned his Hitchcock lessons well).

I remember as The Sweet Hereafter was ending I was convinced I had only been watching it for about 20 minutes and indeed everything to that point was just the exposition. I think the achronological character of the film confused me. I'm not sure if that's a good thing or a bad thing. I worry that my increased cineliteracy would make the fiml totally intelligible and assimilable to me now and I wouldn't have that strange reaction anymore.

― amateurist (amateurist), Tuesday, 13 May 2003 22:09 (twenty-two years ago)

The Rosetta ending seemed abrupt when I saw the film for the first time - in the last shot the girl looks at the boy and that's it. The second time around I noticed that the girl never looked at anyone during the whole film. This has to be the most minimalistic happy end of all time, beautiful.

― Frühlingsmute (Wintermute), Tuesday, 13 May 2003 22:25 (twenty-two years ago)

Frühlingsmute -- cool.

― PVC (peeveecee), Tuesday, 13 May 2003 22:26 (twenty-two years ago)

Oh yeah: The Devil, Probably. It makes total sense, though. Or L'Argent for that matter. The last shot ends so quickly you many not even register the last line.

― amateurist (amateurist), Tuesday, 13 May 2003 22:29 (twenty-two years ago)

A lot of freeze-frame endings seem abrupt, like the filmmakers didn't know how to end it. Of course 400 Blows is the most famous because it actually works and gives me chills every time.

Days Of Thunder has a laughable freeze-frame ending. And Schrader's Cat People has a ludicrous freeze-unfreeze-freeze again freeze frame ending.

amateurist -- I can't remember the Les Cousins ending.

― PVC (peeveecee), Tuesday, 13 May 2003 22:33 (twenty-two years ago)

More recently The Rules Of Attraction which has an abrupt-abrupt ending culled right from the book itself.

― PVC (peeveecee), Tuesday, 13 May 2003 22:34 (twenty-two years ago)

Godard seems to have a penchant for endings like this too.

― PVC (peeveecee), Tuesday, 13 May 2003 22:35 (twenty-two years ago)

What is not ludicrous about Cat People?

― amateurist (amateurist), Tuesday, 13 May 2003 22:36 (twenty-two years ago)

yes.

― PVC (peeveecee), Tuesday, 13 May 2003 22:36 (twenty-two years ago)

I love the audio commentary on the Cat People DVD, where Schrader yammers on and on about the art design and you're like, "HELLO! WHAT THE FUCK IS YOUR FILM ABOUT?!"

― amateurist (amateurist), Tuesday, 13 May 2003 22:40 (twenty-two years ago)

lol.

― PVC (peeveecee), Tuesday, 13 May 2003 22:46 (twenty-two years ago)

La Femme Nikita had a pretty good abrupt ending too if I remember correctly.

― PVC (peeveecee), Tuesday, 13 May 2003 22:48 (twenty-two years ago)

Quiz: for how long can you stare at this photo without wanting to slap Paul Schrader?

http://i.imdb.com/Photos/Ss/0298744/autofocus_13.jpg

― amateurist (amateurist), Tuesday, 13 May 2003 22:49 (twenty-two years ago)

Bad Lieutenant. Existenz. Blade Runner (director's cut). All kind of open to debate... but still fairly hard edged in the way they cut off.

― PVC (peeveecee), Tuesday, 13 May 2003 22:53 (twenty-two years ago)

Not sure what did me in, the glasses, the soul patch or the pretentious pose. But my view to slap time was about 3 seconds.

― PVC (peeveecee), Tuesday, 13 May 2003 22:54 (twenty-two years ago)

One second. Those glasses want to fly.

― Frühlingsmute (Wintermute), Tuesday, 13 May 2003 23:00 (twenty-two years ago)

Since endings are the hardest part of a film to make (since you can't get around bad writing) the abrupt ending, cop-out though it often is, is still preferable since you can argue the abruptness is part of the point. Superior example: The Conversation, which I saw for the first time last might. (OK, there is pleasure in watching the audience go "uhh?")

― b.R.A.d. (Brad), Tuesday, 13 May 2003 23:37 (twenty-two years ago)

CAT PEOPLE RULES

― slutsky (slutsky), Wednesday, 14 May 2003 00:00 (twenty-two years ago)

you know the rest

― slutsky (slutsky), Wednesday, 14 May 2003 00:00 (twenty-two years ago)

The ultimate shocker ending: La Haine (Hate)! If that isn't a cinematic punch to the stomach, what is?

Other examples of good abrupt endings:

Chinatown
Storytelling
Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer
Brazil
Garage Olimpo
Monday
Train de vie (Train of Life)

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Wednesday, 14 May 2003 07:28 (twenty-two years ago)

An abrupt ending that kills me and cracked me up when I first saw it is "Hell's Angels on Wheels" starring Jack Nicholson.

I won't go into details since there may be some people who like those acid fried late 60s biker outlaw kind of movies that haven't seen this one.

All I have to say is that people need to start making new movies that are like this one. PLOT -- ride around on bikes, get wasted, paint naked girls, fight, then repeat.

― earlnash, Wednesday, 14 May 2003 12:37 (twenty-two years ago)

Final Destination 2 has a grebt abrupt end. that is all.

― Alan (Alan), Wednesday, 14 May 2003 13:15 (twenty-two years ago)

roman polanski's the ninth gate - totally abrupt, not at all "good".

also godard's contempt comes to mind.

― j fail (cenotaph), Wednesday, 14 May 2003 13:43 (twenty-two years ago)

Limbo by John Sayles. Apparently, it was booed mightily in a lot of places, and a lot of people asked for their money back because of the ending. I liked it. It's definitely abrupt and can easily be seen as a big fuck you to anyone expecting a resolution. In other words, you can see how it would piss people off.

― scott seward, Thursday, 15 May 2003 03:53 (twenty-two years ago)

I love the end of Limbo. And the suggestiuon is kinda there in the title.

(Beauty of it is that there are only two possible resolutions - happy & sad, its kind of Schrodingers Cat in a film. I like the happy ending, I', going with it).

We could also talk about films which should have ended half an hour before. Like Training Day, which has a built in, morally ambivalent rather good ending which it then ignores.

― Pete (Pete), Thursday, 15 May 2003 09:52 (twenty-two years ago)

Jeanne Dielman, strange considering the final motionless shot lasts for something like six minutes.

― Eric H. (Eric H.), Saturday, 17 May 2003 06:01 (twenty-two years ago)

Monkey Island 2: Le Chuck's Revenge.

― Chuck Tatum (Chuck Tatum), Saturday, 17 May 2003 14:44 (twenty-two years ago)

Blair Witch Project

― Curt1s St3ph3ns, Sunday, 18 May 2003 19:02 (twenty-two years ago)

The Italian Job and Butch&Sundance (and Limbo, which I haven't seen) are the first ones that came to mind.

We could also talk about films which should have ended half an hour before.

Minority Report owns that imaginary thread.

― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Monday, 19 May 2003 11:31 (twenty-two years ago)

How High!!

girl to old boyfriend: "You could never satisfy me"

Meth: "But I can!"

all turn to camera, grin, FREEZEFRAME.

― Sterling Clover (s_clover), Tuesday, 20 May 2003 19:29 (twenty-two years ago)

"The Italian Job" ends so weird, such a cliff hanger (literally).

I'm sure they will turn it into some digital effected ending where the surrogate Michael Caine ends up with the cash and some buxom starlet.

― Earl Nash (earlnash), Wednesday, 21 May 2003 01:18 (twenty-two years ago)

That's all this world needs, a surrogate Michael Caine.

― slutsky (slutsky), Wednesday, 21 May 2003 02:07 (twenty-two years ago)

The ending of the Italian Job was going to lead to a sequel (The Rivera Job) which would start with the cliffhanger. How do they get out of it? By running the engine, using up all the petrol thus making the back of the transporter (where the tank is) lighter allowing the gang to get out. The transporter and gold would plummet to the bottom of the cliff, leaving them the rest of the film to recover it.

Never got made.

― Pete (Pete), Wednesday, 21 May 2003 09:42 (twenty-two years ago)

Karate Kid.

― David Beckhouse (David Beckhouse), Friday, 30 May 2003 03:18 (twenty-two years ago)

Kind Hearts and Coronets (awesome film, saw it for the first time last week) has a very good abrupt ending that somehow manages to be ambiguous AND satisfying. Remarkable, that.

― Justyn Dillingham (Justyn Dillingham), Friday, 30 May 2003 13:08 (twenty-two years ago)

the french connection almost has the perfect abrupt ending, but ruins it with the where are they now b.s. i mean the movie should end with the gunshot in that abandoned building, but it doesnt.

― todd swiss (eliti), Saturday, 31 May 2003 19:12 (twenty-two years ago)

Christ! Amateurist's posts have dyin' to see Cat People. I find Schrader intersting, wildly uneven but I'm hoping his single entry into the horror will satisfy my expectations of pretentious crazy shit.

The ending of French Connection 2 is also shockingly abrupt, more so than the first because it avoids the docudrama text on screen of the first. Sometimes I think I prefer elements of Frankenheimer's sequel than Freidkin's film. The sequel might do a better job of problematizing Detective Doyle's relentless aggression.

― theodore fogelsanger, Saturday, 31 May 2003 23:13 (twenty-two years ago)

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