can someone please clarify the ending of this movie?
so ari was in the field with jo kang and then she was taken away by a bright light. so did she die or was she really taken by the aliens?
I was confused coz in the end jo kang said that she was really taken by the aliens...also, did he know that ari has AIDS?
thanks!
I thought that the ending was left pretty vague - I don't think there's a clear answer, and that it's left up to the viewer to decide whether Ari was "really" taken by aliens, or whether the person who's telling the story (Jo Kang) is simply telling what he wants to believe. (The whole movie is from his point of view of what happened, so yes, he knows about Ari's AIDS). I still liked the movie, but think that if it was every remade for American audiences, some of these ambiguities could be clarified.
shareDear bretw!!! PLEEEEASE don't jinx a classic! America will make an Absolute & Utter FLUCK UP of the remake. It hurts me to even read that :-) Peace!!
shareThe flashbacks to what happened to Ari were the priest telling Jo Kang what happened, so he definitely knew she had AIDS.
As far as the alien part, she definitely was not abducted. The movie is trying to show the alienation that the stigma of having AIDS can create in it's sufferers. It was Ari's coping mechanism basically. There was a point in the movie where Ari mentions how Jo Kang no longer believes her stories the way he did when they were younger. He builds the crop circles and takes her out there to both try to cope with the terrible reality of AIDS by trying to buy into her story and to show Ari he still believes in her.
At least that's what I got out of the movie:) It was such a beautiful movie, made me cry like I haven't in awhile.
Made me cry too. And i also think there was no aliens.
Ari was not leaving in a spaceship. I think that was her `symbolic´ death.
She wanted to cover her pain and her disease with an authentic alien story.
Jo Kang wanted to believe in the alien story too, so that he wouldn`t suffer as much if he faced her disease and that she would die eventually because of it.
So, trying to believe Ari was going to leave...in a spaceship, was like pretending she wasn`t sick and she was not going to die, she was just leaving..
Believing in that made it seem less painful.
Anything but facing the hard truth.
So i guess i`ll just have to...make you bleedo. - Mankind (Mick Foley)
The lights overhead at the end are from the helicopter that was sent from the hospital to retrieve her. That's all. It's designed to make you think for a moment that the "alien" bit could be true, before you realize that it's just a brief moment for the characters to both buy into the fantasy she's created before once again facing the reality.
share(Spoliers)
The ending was a nice touch. Depends on how you interpret it, but personally I thought it was tragic. The director purposely set it up to show how Jo Kang carries on A-ri's white lie, and creates an illusion of her "departure". A-ri died right after the moment she tells Jo kang about how she was feeling sleepy. There is a long pause, and the camera pans slowly giving us a mid-shot of the two in embrace. That was "the end". A-ri had left this world, so to speak. Now what's tragic is that Jo Kang (remember, my opinion), refuses to let her go, and simply transforms A-ri's death into a permanent leave of absence. Later on, we see him smiling, happy, as he cherishes every moment, fulfilling his promise of sending her off with a smile. I really think that Jo kang believes that one day he will see his other half again. But in this world, we all know he is a fool.
Well it looks like the other posts have some of it broken down.The bright light represented her death and probably being taken by helicopter. Yes he knew she had AIDS. We(audience) learn the truth when Jo Kang does through flashbacks.The flashbacks occurred when the priest told Jo Kang the entire story after he made it clear he would set himself on fire.
The movie is full of symbolism,metaphors,etc. Basically she tells you the truth from the beginning in the form of lies,symbolism and metaphors. When she talks about aliens/curse she means AIDS. When she said UFO's kept appearing around her. She was talking about various viruses. When she talks about NASA. She is talking about the hospital/doctors.And when she talks about going into space on a spaceship. That equals her death. Before Jo Kang knew the truth he talked about wanting to go on a spaceship with her. It meant dying and that's why she said he couldn't go with her.He didn't know that at the time.
Jo Kang gets the measles and cold from her. HIV destroys the immune system and AIDS is the end result. Since her body can't fight off diseases. People around her can become susceptible to those viruses. She was scared for him because she exposed him to those viruses.She most likely had just HIV during that time. It probably didn't become full blown AIDS until around the later part of the movie.
Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by rulers as useful.