MovieChat Forums > La noire de... (1966) Discussion > Question about the ending?

Question about the ending?


I just watched the movie. I thought it was brilliantly done. Can anyone explain the last scene with the mask? I would love to hear your interpretation.

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My interpretation was that the mask represented the Devil, the evil that is permanently being carried around. So when he takes her possessions back, he feels he is doing a good thing, the right thing, but the Devil isn't going to let him forget what happened under his roof, that evil will always be following him.

"God, when I meet you, I'm gonna be pretty. If it's the last thing I do. I'll be a beautiful angel."

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Wow! That was brilliant! It made perfect sense. Thank you!!!!

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The devil interpretation is a bit too simple, I'd say. The mask may represent all kinds of things, but I think it boils down to this that it's a representation of the Senegalese spirit.

For it's the spirit that is subdued when the black girl is away and forced into slavery, she is broken by her masters and she tries to hold on to the mask by taking it away again from them, feeling they have no right to own it. It's basically the symbol of her lost freedom, everything that she left behind. The Senegalese boy puts on the mask at the end, cause that's where it belongs, and interestingly the black girl wanted to tend the children, and thus a child picks it up and looks back at the Frenchman. From the Frenchman's point of view of course the mask is a haunting "devilish" presence, but that's also due to the fact that he doesn't really grasp what it stands for for the Senegalase woman.

Artimidor
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