Unresolved Endings

[UniverseX259]

I like a movie that makes me think, and this is when an ambiguous ending can work well.

For me a prime example of this is American Psycho. I was talking about the ending with some friends, and we realized the ending could be interpreted in many ways - He did all the killings, he's someone else pretending to be Patrick Bateman, none of it ever happened, etc. This makes a lot of sense when you think of Bateman placing the call to his lawyer, and then what happens when he sees his lawyer at the end.

[CHWolf]

As per the Mist ending, there are several problems with it beyond the actual shooting. From the top...

1.) The actual shooting, and the fact not one person in the car said: "Well, we JUST ran out of gas. Let's hang out a few minutes and see if anything even knows we're here."

2.) Every character sacrificed so that group can live died for nothing. Every harrowing moment doing this or that would've been better spent stealing Oreos.

3.) Every evil character left in the supermarket lives.

4.) No one mentioned in #2 will (most likely) ever face even the slightest retribution for that shit.

5.) The Mist and the creatures therein fall very easily before the might of a small group of soldiers with fire, so the threat is ultimately undermined and made relatively simple to overcome as far as horror movies go. (Even Chucky kept going after being burned to shit.)

6.) The ending smells a bit like anti-assisted-suicide propaganda. Never give up hope or you'll be sorry!


I could go on - basically everything that occurred in the film was nullified. Nothing needed to happen, and anyone doing anything at all was ill-advised.

"Do nothing" was the solution to it all for all the characters we met.

Barring that, "get together some cans of hairspray and lighters" would have protected everyone.


It's sort of like "Aleins" ending with Ripley shooting Newt in the head only to find the Aliens can be dissolved by lemonade... and she only finds this out when some other Space Marines show up, dump cups on a few facehuggers, and look at her like "What the fuck are you stressing about, bitch?"

[jedipencil]

The Mist had such an awful ending, imo. The viewer is made to go through all that angst, get invested in those characters, etc etc, and for what? Zip. It made (for me) the story absolutely meaningless.

Unresolved endings are alot like dark and milk chocolate - it's all a matter of taste as everyone is different, I think, and how well it's done. I don't like unresolved endings, 99% of the time, because when I read a book, I want to read the author's/protagonist's/whatever character's view on such and such situation. (because, for me, that is what a story ends up being, even though it isn't written that way). To leave the ending unresolved is like saying "here, you finish it, with your own opinion".

I want to know someone else's viewpoint, not mine.

The Mist doesn't do that, so that is a point in its favor, I suppose.

Just my one cent.

[Magnus]

We can all disagree if we liked the ending of The Mist or not, but how does that ending make the story meaningless?

Because they don't prevail in a positive sense doesn't devaluate everything up until that point as meaningless. A cynical and pessimistic POV on life, sure, but meaningless? Not where I come from.

Do you guys find Eyes Wide Shut meaningless because of its ending, too? Or I Stand Alone? Or Irreversible? Or Natural Born Killers? Or No Country For Old Men? All of these end without concluding the plot, but speaks strongly about the theme of the story.


:M:
www.magnus-aspli.com

[jedipencil]

I didn't mean to offend anyone. My comment about it being meaningless, was from my personal point of view. For that particular story, I felt used as a viewer. The point of telling a story (in my opinion) is to share an idea, point of view, emotion, what have you, and give it something to do: entertain, give a morale, make the reader/viewer feel something for the "hero" of the story, show a viewpoint the reader/viewer might not have considered before, etc etc.

The only point I got from The Mist was that you struggle like a dog to protect what you love, attempt to overcome hopeless odds, monsters, and maniacal humans only to give up at the end. And then find out you were wrong, to boot.

I fully admit that I'm am literarily deficient in comprehending the deeper meanings of these things, but I'm sorry... stories like these make me feel used.

With all due respect of course, I fully understand others get something else out of them, and that's great.

[Ulf Imwiehe]

In a way I liked the cruel ending of The Mist. Life can be brutal like that. You struggle and you fight and you give it everything you've got and in the end it doesn't change a thing. I do agree, though, that it adds a layer to the overall theme that can be read as somewhat distasteful, even promoting passivity and dependence – sit tight, don't do anything, let the authorities take care of your problems and everything will be fine.

That said, I wouldn't say it's an unresolved ending. It's harsh and cruel (if a bit inelegantly written) but its impact stays with you for a long time for better or worse. I think Magnus raised a good point in that you don't give the audience what it wants, you give it what it needs. And sometimes what's required is a literary knuckle sandwich. If that's really what The Mist needed is a different matter, of course.

I don't know, I like writers who don't pull any punches and put their characters through the wringer. As long as it makes the story more powerful and isn't just gratuitous cruelty for cruelty's sake.

[CHWolf]

Summed up: Don't shoot the shaggy dog.

To heavily paraphrase: "There was once a man with a shaggy dog. The man and the shaggy dog went everywhere together. The shaggy dog slept at the foot of the man's bed, and the man fed him scraps from the table. Then one day the man shot the shaggy dog in the head. The End."


...

Don't shoot the shaggy dog. It makes people angry and sad.

[Ulf Imwiehe]

I don't know. If you really have to shoot the freaking dog at least do so in an interesting way. Seriously, I kinda like the bleak pointlessness of that particular trope. Of course, it only works with writers who understand how to really make me care about the characters (and shaggy dogs) they slaughter so cynically and mercilessly.

[CHWolf]

By the way - Jane's screaming after he shot his son made me laugh.

Is there something wrong with my soul?

I think I already know the answer.

[jedipencil]

Maybe if the movie had shown waves of evil monsters going by the car, and we would get the notion that, oh well, it really was hopeless and the kid and woman died quick instead of horribly, well then there would have been a point. But what is the point of a tale when all this cool setup is done, interesting characters are introduced to us, we cheer the death of a maniacal fundamentalist (sorry couldn't resist), and then shoop! The rug is pulled out, and we're told ha ha, the hero did everything for nothiing. Essentially. What is the point that I obviously missed?

I point fingers at this movie, but I mean in general for this type of tale... with all due respect and all of course...

[Scribbly]

The ending of this thread may be unresolved.

[CHWolf]

And so Scribbly got away with the loot and the Mods were convicted on several counts of Police brutality and were given lengthy prison terms.

The End.

[Biofungus]

Originally Posted by CHWolf

Another case of 'thou shalt not screw with the source material'.

I mean, sure it HAD to be whittled down and adapted for film - but that's a sight different from wantonly 'screwing with' it.

Except King has stated officially that he actually liked the movie resolution better than his own. Considering how outspoken and critical King has been of how his books have been treated by hollywood, I think it's a legitimate comment.

How about Se7en? Yes, Pitt looked in the box and yes, we all know what was in it. But he shot Spacey before he could reveal what he did with the body!

[CHWolf]

I don't trust King's judgement about anything but writing books, but even so I still wouldn't substitute his judgement for mine - I still think messing with material that wildly should be a no-no.



Spoiler:

The sequel to Se7en, titled Se8en, will feature the ambulatory, headless body as the main protagonist.

[martin993]

Originally Posted by jedipencil

The only point I got from The Mist was that you struggle like a dog to protect what you love, attempt to overcome hopeless odds, monsters, and maniacal humans only to give up at the end. And then find out you were wrong, to boot.

But you just glossed over the most important part of it: he gave up at the end. That's the only thing he was wrong about. The people who died for nothing only did so because Tom Jane gave up. If he'd kept struggling, everything he'd done would've paid off. Giving up, says the film, is a mistake. The people from the supermarket didn't give up on their beliefs and they were saved. Tom Jane's group had just seen a monster the size of Godzilla if I remember rightly. And no-one in the car had flamethrowers handy, so it doesn't matter how easily monsters fall to them. All Tom Jane had was hope and he was punished in the harshest possible way when he gave that up. It's a super nice message! (Actually the same message as Shawshank, but delivered in the opposite way.) I loved that ending to bits!

Unresolved endings don't do anything for me. Neither do ambiguous ones generally. They just get on my nerves and take me out of the story at the worst possible time.