The ending?


I found the ending a little vague and was wondering if anyone had any input. I just watched the movie for the first time and perhaps haven't had enough time to digest it. Thanks a lot.

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The ending seemed to indicate that the whole movie was just a dream. At least that is what it seemed like in the version of the film that is in the Marlon Brando film collection. It's a pretty bad ending, in my opinion, but the rest of the film is worthwhile.

Basically, it looked like Brando took out Boone's character, and a little later, the kidnapped girl "wakes up" from her dream on the airplane.

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The ending I saw was with Richard Boone putting on his trenchcoat and at the door saying: "Thank you for such a pleasurable time" or something to that effect and the camera zooms to a the hanging lifeless body of the Pamela Franklin character. I was so digusted and angry at this movie, I wondered at the decency of the people who made it.

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I don't think so either which was why it depressed me.

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It shouldn't depress you. Even if it wasn't a dream, she didn't die. When "Bud" took her down from the doorframe, she appeared a little worse for wear but definitely alive and in no apparent danger of dying anytime soon.

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She did not look about to die, for sure. Perhaps her swoon and the deja vu replay was the Pamela Franklin character's way of mentally blacking out the past 36 hours--subconsciously deciding to remember nothing between meeting Brando at the airport and the rescue in the room.

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Actually you should watch it again. You'll see there's a bullet hole in her back. Her death is what makes the whole ending more poignant.

As for the ending, I thought it was great. I think a lot of people misinterpret it as "oh it was just a dream and nothing ever happened". But actually it's an "omniscient (3rd person) flashback" to the beginning, and it does not imply anything other than "just remember how it all began, folks". If any of you have seen the excellent Korean film Bittersweet Life, it has a similar out-of-sequence ending which confuses a lot of people. Or the Japanese film A Scene at the Sea uses the technique, also (gotta love Asian films!).

Chronologically this movie ends with her death. The epilogue is just an artistic closer, like a symphonic piece may have a coda which recapitulates the introduction. I know I haven't explained myself very well, but it's very tricky to explain. And I'm probably totally wrong anyway :P

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rooprect: Actually you should watch it again. You'll see there's a bullet hole in her back. Her death is what makes the whole ending more poignant.

As for the ending, I thought it was great. I think a lot of people misinterpret it as "oh it was just a dream and nothing ever happened". But actually it's an "omniscient (3rd person) flashback" to the beginning, and it does not imply anything other than "just remember how it all began, folks". If any of you have seen the excellent Korean film Bittersweet Life, it has a similar out-of-sequence ending which confuses a lot of people. Or the Japanese film A Scene at the Sea uses the technique, also (gotta love Asian films!).

Chronologically this movie ends with her death. The epilogue is just an artistic closer, like a symphonic piece may have a coda which recapitulates the introduction. I know I haven't explained myself very well, but it's very tricky to explain. And I'm probably totally wrong anyway :P


As much as I've accepted that Dupont's daughter doesn't die in Brando's arms, that her last sigh is not her last breath, and that what looks like a bullet hole in her back is not a bullet hole, I find rooprect's angle on all this compelling. The idea of the 'omniscient (3rd person) flashback' is just so much more elegant than director Cornfield's suggestion that the film describes a 'premonition dream'. It's an utterly daft idea.

Still, a fine film - and Rita Moreno is just brilliant, outshining everyone else on screen.

The lion and the calf shall lie down together, but the calf won't get much sleep.

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Doh, did Cornfield really call it a 'premonition dream'? Ehh I guess that squashes my interpretation. But I think I'll stick to it--against the director's intentions--just because I can't stand "it was just a dream" endings. Like you said, pod, it's utterly daft.

Back to the death/not-death of Dupont's daughter... I'll definitely have to watch it again. It was the bullet hole(?) that made me think she was dead, but it's possible that it was just a wound or a gash from getting beat up. But then another thought occurs to me; if she was still alive, then why didn't Brando immediately call an ambulance instead of leaving her? Well, in either case I suppose it doesn't make much of a difference. I guess the point is that it ended in a bad way.

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But the only moment when we might suspect she'd dead is after Brando has carried her to the bed and she gives an exhausted sigh. She's then still, and the film cuts to the next scene. If the 'bullet hole' was proof of death, she'd have been still from the moment Brando sees her strung up. Yet, as someone has already pointed out, corpses don't tend to open and close their eyes, move and sigh. (Having said that, as morgue attendants know only too well, that's not exactly true).

But no, your interpretation regarding the return to the beginning is not 'squashed'. Stick with it! It's sometimes said that artists are the worst people to reveal the truth of their own work; perhaps that applies to directors no less than anyone else.

The lion and the calf shall lie down together, but the calf won't get much sleep.

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Yet, as someone has already pointed out, corpses don't tend to open and close their eyes, move and sigh. (Having said that, as morgue attendants know only too well, that's not exactly true).

Haha that reminds me of the scene in Aguirre, the Wrath of God where one character gets an arrow right through the heart and presumably dies with eyes open ...but if you watch carefully, you see the eyes close a few seconds later. I never knew if that was accidental, deliberate (in a ghostly surreal way), or maybe the person wasn't supposed to be dead after all.

But yeah now that you mention it, in Night I do remember the sigh after she's placed on the bed ...like you said earlier, whether that's her last breath is up for grabs. And we can also assume that Brando called the ambulance during the scene cut.

It's sometimes said that artists are the worst people to reveal the truth of their own work; perhaps that applies to directors no less than anyone else.

And that reminds me of the hilarious scene in Singles...

INTERVIEWER: A song like "Touch Me, I'm Dick" is about... what?
ARTIST: Well, I think "Touch Me, I'm Dick," in essence, speaks for itself, you know. I think that, you know, that's basically what the song is, um... about... is about, you know... I-I think a lot of people might think it's actually about, you know,"My name is Dick, and, you know, you can touch me," but, I think, you know, it can be seen either way.


Haha now that's how all artists & directors should respond to questions of interpretation. Yeah, I'll go ahead and stick with my crazy theory :D

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I wish the film had all been a dream, then I might not have to remember it. Such a stupid movie full of silly direction and silly plot twists.

Interesting to note that Brando refused to give the look that the director wanted for the ending, and so the director had to freeze-frame it on a brief smiling moment where Brando wasn't pulling a face or trying to wreck the scene.

I viewed the ending as a dream/premonition... it's certainly what the director intended. Even if it wasn't the case, it still felt irrelevant when it hadn't even been made clear what the girl's fate was beforehand.

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I wish the film had all been a dream, then I might not have to remember it. Such a stupid movie full of silly direction and silly plot twists.

LOL. I like the film, but it looks like those who don't might have the best jokes.

The lion and the calf shall lie down together, but the calf won't get much sleep.

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It's o.k. movie with good performances from Brando and Boone.

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I dont' know what version you may have seen, but the one I saw ON DEMAND had it end where the kidnapping began with Brando introducing himself as the girl's chauffeur. I think this movie or its ending is a precursor to those we have currently with those bizarre "coulda/woulda/mighta" happen/-ed-type endings...


Interesting, but not quite cult or classic status.

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The only problem I had with the ending is it is a hoary old cliche going all the way back to "Dead of Night" in 1941 and used up to the present day, usually whenever the filmmakers have run out of ideas. To the movie's credit though, it was less hoary and cliche back in 1969 and it was obviously always intended to be part of the movie, at least.

As for the version that apparently ends with the Richard Boone character thanking the girl for "a good time", that is obviously a truncated print, and the restored ending, hoary cliches and all, makes the whole thing a lot more surreal and a lot more platable.

Exterminate the Brutes!

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You guys didn't see the bullet hole in her side just before Brando took her down? She died in his arms. The segue to her being told by Rita Moreno to buckle up was a cheap gimmick to confuse the audience because the writers couldn't achieve a bang-up ending. They grind these b movies out and use big name stars to boost theater attendance. Martin was strung up on a door. How many healthy people would just dangle from a door especially when it would be so easy to escape? Perhaps the ending was as Brando was holding Martin he flashed back to the time that he first saw her and regretted going through with the whole thing in the first place.

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I seem to subscribe to oldecay's interpretation the most, although I do maintain that it's a cop-out ending and unsatisfying (the last shot of Brando is really unflattering!).

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Joan Crawford did this alot!

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According to the director's commentary, the whole movie was a "premonition dream"

"You think I was telling you the truth? Maybe...maybe."

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