END ALREADY!!!

The last 20 minutes are an excellent compliment to the rest of the movie.

You're entitled to your opinion, but I strongly disagree with it. Ending this movie with the graduation scene would have left so many parts of the story unresolved.

For example, when Randall was sent to be an instructor, he was told to come back when he felt he was ready. Well, by graduation time, is he? In the first rescue with Jake, we see that indeed he is not. He is still trying to cope with what happened. Also, Randall's final scene seems both necessary and highly appropriate for bringing closure to his character. This is a man who has spent his life devoted to his work, to the point that he has neglected (and lost) his wife. If he can no longer do this work, what is to become of him? Ending the movie at the graduation scene would have left this question unanswered. Instead, the ending gives us an answer.

The scenes from graduation through the movie's ending also resolve some issues for Jake. Sure, he has completed training, but is he ready for the reality of this job? We see in those rescue scenes that he is. How about his relationship with Emily? At the time of graduation, he is prepared to leave her behind. But he learns from his additional time with Randall how important it is to balance your personal life with your work; he learns not to make the same mistake as Randall (i.e., devoting all of his energy to his work and making this work, which will one day have to come to an end, his entire identity).

Finally, though, an important theme in this movie is the passing of the torch from the experienced but aging hero to the next generation. The final scene, where Randall's life is sacrificed so Jake can go on to save others, is an incredibly powerful way to illustrate that theme.

I get that this kind of movie is not everyone's cup of tea. It's a shame that you found the final scenes so unnecessary, and that for you they detracted from the movie's overall quality. But as someone who thoroughly enjoyed this movie, I very much agree with the producers' decision to include them.

The movie was only about 4 minutes too long. The opening voice-over tells us about a man who lives beneath the sea. We don't hear any more about him. That begins the arc, which is completed in the sequence near the end when the final survivor is pulled out and recounts having been saved by a man who "never let go". Kutcher's smile of recognition out the helicopter door, and the final voice-over of that sequence which reveals that The Guardian is the eternal spirit of Ben Randall, who is still down there doing what he did in real life. It's the only real surprise in the movie, when we learn that referencess to The Guardian aren't directly to "Coast Guard", but to a Guardian who spent his life in the Coast Guard. A fade to black here would have been a great end to the movie. The final, and ever-so-predictable Officer and a Gentleman ending was a waste, and spoiled the movie for me.