MovieChat Forums > Stellet Licht (2007) Discussion > The ending ruined this film (spoilers)

The ending ruined this film (spoilers)

posted 15 years ago by Voice-in-the-Machine
25 replies | jump to latest

As I was watching this film I just kept thinking, "this really could be a modern masterpiece, but we'll have to see where Reygadas takes it..." During the scene where Esther is crying in the rain, I felt sort of like I was watching a no-hitter in baseball, everything was falling in to place for a perfect film. And then.... well, she wakes from the dead. Now this alone wasn't the problem, but rather it felt so utterly out of place in this film. It felt forced, nonsensical, comical even. I just didn't see it coming at all, nor would I have ever expected it. In "Ordet," which Reygadas definitely pays homage to and on which he structured this resurrection sequence, the resurrection actually makes sense. "Ordet" is a film completely about faith. It's a film based on Kieerkegaard's conception of faith, and this is evident right from the opening scene with a "madman" preaching the bible in the sand dunes. "Ordet" walks the line between reality and surrealism. And so the ending of that movie fits -- it's the natural conclusion of the theme that runs throughout the film. In fact, the viewer finds themselves wishing for it to happen.

In "Stellet Licht" on the other hand, the movie is completely steeped in realism. Never once during the film is there a single scene that hints at any sort of surrealist ending or metaphysical activity. There were some vague and underwhelming allusions to spirituality and religion, but if I was supposed to be viewing this film as a crisis of faith, then there needed to be a few more script revisions. Maybe I just started down the wrong track from the beginning, but to me this film was about relationships, personal choice and consequence, obligation vs. following the heart, etc. The comments between Johan and his father about the devil just seemed to illustrate some of the internal forces that were making this decision so hard for him. I really cannot believe that this was a film about a crisis of faith in the more strict meaning of the phrase.

And then in the end, the Dreyer references are so thick that I found myself struggling to overlay the two films. Was Marriane Jesus incarnate? Did Johan just not have enough pure faith to bring her back to life? For such a simplistically real and beautiful film, I'm depressed that I'm even asking myself these questions.

Unfortunately it just seemed like Reygadas didn't quite know how to end this film, and so he chose to pay homage to his favorite filmmaker as a sort of way to avoid giving the film it's own natural conclusion. And so he "cut and pasted" across two films that really should not have been intertwined. He forced this ending, and I honestly have no idea what he was trying to get across. The best I can come up with is simply, "Esther just needed someone to show her true compassion and love, and this would give her her life back." But if this is it, why make such a message steeped in religious overtones and references? Either the film needed to make faith and religion a stronger theme in the beginning, or make it a lesser theme in the end. The two just don't mix otherwise. Bummer, I really was hoping for something with this film.

[–] prodigylover 15 years ago

"Never once during the film is there a single scene that hints at any sort of surrealist ending or metaphysical activity."

What about the moment where a leaf seems to fall from the ceiling of the bedroom?
Or the fact that it's seemingly spring (and we're in Mexico) and yet when Johan visits his father, there's snow covering the ground?

And yet, I do somewhat feel that the ending just felt like a hollow remake of Ordet without doing anything much different with it. If Dreyer were more popular, people would be calling Reygadas a copycat -- but instead it's merely an "homage."

[–] 15 years ago

[deleted]

[–] flickfever 15 years ago

SPOILERS...

As Marianne said: "Peace is stronger than love."

If Johan's "love" and regret couldn't bring Esther back to life (metaphorically), then all it took was Marianne's offering of peace. She came to reconcile with her, thus bringing closure to Esther's demise.

I thought that there was enough symbolism, subtext and surrealism to justify such an out-there ending.

[–] 15 years ago

[deleted]

[–] MikelGuillen 15 years ago

He's a copycat. He's a talented artist but some scenes are "stolen below the belt" in other words it's trendy to steal ideas and refered to them as "Homage".

To quote Salvador Dali, "true artists dont create, they steal"

[–] nycterr 15 years ago

I thought that the doctor, being from the same religious sect was not very keen on "science" - he even hints about something like that - and therefore that Esther never really died, but was in some sort of a coma. But the "religious" doctor couldn't see that and thought she was dead.

So Esther never really died.

I agree that the film was filled with sur-real atmosphere, the bathing scene, the leaf, the empty restaurant, the camera angles ...

(About the snow scene at his father, i assumed it was just later in the season - the calendar marks december)

[–] 15 years ago

[deleted]

[–] zsoltga 15 years ago

Agreed completely. Great film other than this hackneyed finale...which is kind of sad.

[–] refeerf 15 years ago

Esther never died. She and Marianne devised a way to help Johan come to the conclusion -- and the peace of knowing -- that the life he was leading before the affair, WAS the life he wanted. The only way for him to realize this was to lose it. ("You don't know what you got, until you lose it..." John Lennon, Walls and Bridges, 1974).

So...Marianne has someone call and request something from Johann. Johann sets out with Esther. Esther gets out, weeps against the side of the tree and falls to the ground, waiting for Johan to come find her and assume she is dead, after she has taken the 'medicine" referred to that slows down the pulse.

In on the plot are other members of the Mennonite community who know that Johan needs help getting back to a place of sanity and peace. The doctor tells Johan Esther is dead, the family go through the motions of preparing her for burial. Marianne shows up, ascertains that Johan's entire focus is on Esther...then goes inside the viewing chamber, as planned between Esther and Marianne...and is thanked by Esther for what she has done for both Johan and her.

No surrealism, magic realism, faith...just two gals getting together and hatching a plan.

End of story. End of film.

[–] twopoint0 15 years ago

Wow, that is a great interpretation of the film. It works with keeping with the realism of the film that the other posters thought was destroyed. It also makes sense that such a close knit community would come band together to solve this problem.
Though, I would have to see it again with this viewpoint in mind to completely agree.
But still I agree on one thing, that the resurrection should not be taken literally.
http://www.youtube.com/zammit99

[–] 15 years ago

[deleted]

[–] pdelamore 14 years ago

I saw this the same way as refeerf.

[–] Nick_Dets 15 years ago

Very interesting indeed, but too far-fetched.

They go to the doctor, the doctor distinctly tells Johan that Esther is dead. Saying that the doctor was in on the ploy is way, way too much to believe. It is also way too conventional of a "twist" ending and I have a hard time seeing Reygadas intending it to be meant that way.

[–] toddcfitzgerald 15 years ago

I don't really have a dog in this fight, but this is how the ending struck me, too. It never occurred to me that Esther's awakening was a miracle until I read these. I just figured a good old fashioned death-faking was some form of Mennonite justice for cheaters, why not.

The funeral seemed remarkably subdued. None of the older children were crying. One smaller child asks the father if death is like sleep, which she says a relative told her. I figured this was to keep the youngins from ruining the scheme, and to take the sting out of the whole "hey, your mom's dead" thing.

When another child beckons the father to come see Esther who's now awake, one relative tells her to leave him alone, but another tells him to go with her. This seemed strange, as if some knew and some didn't.

And when another child is talking to Esther after her awakening, she remarks that one relative "didn't dress up". Who doesn't dress up for a funeral? Someone going to a fake one, probably.

These little things were hard to ignore, since there was so little dialogue in the film, I figured they must have been dropped for a reason.

But let me just say, I have no idea whether this is right. Why the kiss on the mouth from Marianne, then? Was the doctor in on it? I don't know. More importantly, I don't care, because either version of the ending is profoundly annoying and unfitting. The only question I have left is which don't I like more.

[–] wroblewski-adam 15 years ago

I didn't think this movie was steeped in realism at all. Wide-angle lens, subjective camera, very deliberate compositions; the ending didn't seem too out of place for me.

[–] 15 years ago

[deleted]

[–] 15 years ago

[deleted]

[–] Nick_Dets 15 years ago

What miracle occurs in "Mister Lonely"? The painted heads coming to life and singing? That was a visual moment - a (day)dream sequence that is surprising because there was nothing quite like it in the rest of the film. But, as you say, the absurdity is acknowledged.

The ending of "Silent Light," to me, is a similar visual moment. I think concluding that it "isn't meant to be absurd at all" is a bit premature.

[–] Nick_Dets 15 years ago

Let's not forget two shots: The shot in the beginning where Johan stops the clock and the shot in the end at the viewing where someone starts it up again.

Time had stopped metaphorically. They were in an existential netherworld because of the affair. The gesture of kindness and reverence shown by Marianne at the end that "resurrects" Esther is very possibly meant to suggest a similarly metaphorical progression from this netherworld.

The film's book-ending of the shot of a new day and, later, the end of a day shows this as well.

I don't think we should be so quickly calling the ending a second-rate rip of of "Ordet" - Reygadas isn't a director to fashionably reference a film out of indulgence.

[–] fulcanelli 14 years ago

I had a different reaction to the ending. Well, a different interpretation. Since the film did not actually show anybody other than Marianne and the daughter speaking to the mom, I thought perhaps Marianne's guilt, and the little girl's over active imagination could have envisioned the mother waking up.

Wasn't there anguished screaming as the sun set, along with the moo of the cows?

[–] ssadik 13 years ago

i'd agree with this, i thought so too.

[–] filmorella 14 years ago

It's really interesting to read all the different interpretations to the ending. As I was watching the film, I just thought that the ending offered peace to the audience, after the extremely sad and hard to watch scenes that follow Esther's collapse by the tree. It certainly worked that way for me. But there's got to be more to it than just providing some relief to spectators, of course.

It seems to me that all the interpretations offered here for the ending are possible: Esther reawakening could be a super-natural event, it could be the result of a plot from people in the community, or it could be metaphoric. There are hints in the film pointing towards any of these possibilities. I think this is just an open ending, planned as such by the director, and in that sense I have to respecfully disagree with the original poster of this thread. For me, the ending does not ruin the film, it actually makes it better, highlighting all the ambiguities and complexities involved in matters of faith and familiy, and the moral conflicts implicit in how humans strive to be both super natural and natural beings. With the open ending, Reygadas is showing the very different angles from which this can be interpreted, and how difficult it is to judge anyone involved in such conflicts. I really enjoyed that.

As for the Dreyer references, no doubt, but I don't think it explains the ending as just an "homage" to this director. There's much more than that, as the different interpretations offered by posters in this thread show well.

[–] ThomBjork 14 years ago

"Esther never died. She and Marianne devised a way to help Johan come to the conclusion -- and the peace of knowing -- that the life he was leading before the affair, WAS the life he wanted. The only way for him to realize this was to lose it. ("You don't know what you got, until you lose it..." John Lennon, Walls and Bridges, 1974).

So...Marianne has someone call and request something from Johann. Johann sets out with Esther. Esther gets out, weeps against the side of the tree and falls to the ground, waiting for Johan to come find her and assume she is dead, after she has taken the 'medicine" referred to that slows down the pulse.

In on the plot are other members of the Mennonite community who know that Johan needs help getting back to a place of sanity and peace. The doctor tells Johan Esther is dead, the family go through the motions of preparing her for burial. Marianne shows up, ascertains that Johan's entire focus is on Esther...then goes inside the viewing chamber, as planned between Esther and Marianne...and is thanked by Esther for what she has done for both Johan and her.

No surrealism, magic realism, faith...just two gals getting together and hatching a plan.

End of story. End of film."

This is what I thought as well, and I actually predicted this was happen for some reason. Perhaps I've seen enough films or was really observant or into it, but I really did not believe she was dead and believed she was awaken when Marianne entered the room, away from Johann. But that's just me.

[–] GuyOnTheLeft 11 years ago

I am still not sure how to feel about the ending. I can see the OP's point, but also the points of those who liked it. I definitely did take it as a real resurrection though, which--according to someone in another thread--was the director's intent. (There is that theory of "the author is dead" that we shouldn't care what the filmmaker says, but I don't agree.)

I am also torn about the ending of another film this reminded me of (spoiler warning), which was also very much steeped in realism until a resurrection right at the end: the French film "Ponette".

--------
See a list of my favourite films here: http://www.flickchart.com/slackerinc