MovieChat Forums > 25th Hour (2003) Discussion > Significance of the movie's title (spoil...

Significance of the movie's title (spoilers)


"25th hour" basically connotes lateness. The phrase indicates that there was something you wanted to do or needed to do; but you ran out of time, as there are only 24-hours in the day.

Applying to the movie -- I think the title points to the way Monty realizes too late (i.e. - "at the 25th hour") that he made the wrong choices in life.

At the end of the movie, he realizes that he hung out with the wrong friends; see the realization that the fat Russian (whom he considered a friend) ratted him out. Instead, Monty should have hung out with Jacob & Frank, who are his real friends.

He also had a chance to excel in school. He went to the school where Jacob is currently teaching (a good school), and he was a star basketball player who got kicked out for fighting. So he clearly had opportunity; which he squandered.

At the end, Monty also realizes that his blame was misguided. The mirror scene shows how he tries to blame literally everyone around him. However, at the end, he sees those same people's smiling at him on the street, and he writes his name on the car window for the black boy. He therefore comes to terms with the idea that the people and the city didn’t screw him; he screwed himself over.

Still -- though Monty realizes those things, the fact remains that he learned those things too late; he learned those things at the 25th hour. For that reason, he has to go to jail, not out west. That's because there is no 25th hour; there is no extra time in life to make up for what you did wrong. The movie pushes people to do what is right before the 25th hour.

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