Interesting, Yet Confusing .......

Cool.

So ... I'll try to answer based on what I got out of the movie.


1) Was it me or was Lucy being manipulative at the end by trying to talk Tess in to not coming back ?

I don't think Lucy was being manipulative. I think she was genuinely concerned. However, I don't think Tess did want to come back ... I thought it was odd that she disappeared in the 'hug' and then Lucy seemed to be pulled somewhere. Very confused by this.

2) Was Tess' "gift" something she had all her life that manifested itself as mental illness .... and now that it came all the way out, she was 'cured' ?

I think the point is, that yes, Tess had a ''gift'' her entire life and that the parents just assumed that she had a mental illness because that is easier to believe than the otherworldly.

3) Who did Tess become when Lucy went awhile for a while ? (when Tess ran off and was locked in the basement)

I don't think it mattered. I think it was just to show that something like this could happen with any amount of spirits. (As was shown as Lucy walked through the house after leaving Tess's body. There were many spirits hanging around 'waiting')

4) At the end when Tess' eyes changed, did that signify Lucy was back again ?

I very much think it was Lucy the entire time. She just said it was Tess so that they would stop prodding her to 'move' on. I think she may have gotten pulled back into Tess's body (in that scene earlier that I didn't understand). During the ending Tess was singing the song that Lucy was singing on the playground in front of her friend ... so I think that was supposed to show us that it was actually Tess, plus the changing of the eyes.

5) Was Tess' gift something she was going to keep using ? It didn't seem 'cured' once Lucy left (based on the eye color change I thought I saw)

You did indeed see an eye-color change. But I still think it has been Lucy the entire time. When she was Lucy before her eyes weren't always brown they were Tess's color. I think it's just to show that underneath it all it's actually Lucy. (The eyes are the window to the soul they say!)



Any how. I hope that was helpful. ;) Just my interpretation I'm sure there are others out there.

She could be "Lucy" at the end or she could be like the Indian girl and has learned to use her gift to channel dead people rather than being driven insane by them. It's pretty ambiguous, and intentionally so in my opinion

"Let be be finale of seem/ The only emperor is the Emperor of Ice Cream"

I have a more positive take on the ending.

The girl at the end almost seems to be a mish-mash of Lucy/Tess, so I want to believe that the two different spirits are sharing the same body at different times. Lucy liked swinging and singing, whereas Tess liked playing guitar and skateboarding. The girl at the end did all of this. Tess isn't strong enough at times, so Lucy takes over for a while and they switch back and forth. With the eye-color changing at the end, this is how I choose to interpret it.

I enjoy downer endings as much as the next horror fan, but Lucy as a spirit while frightening at first didn't seem malevolent or vicious in intent (she even asked Tess' mom for one more night) so it wouldn't make sense for her to completely take over Tess' body from spirit Tess and hide it, especially when she can't openly be with the ones she loved from her own life. It makes more sense to me that the two souls share the body and Lucy just never completely "moves on" but almost lives thru Tess, even if on a lesser scale than having full control over the body.

Just my opinion. The ending sort of leaves it to the viewer to interpret. Plus, it's based on a true story so maybe someone with more interest than me in the real-life case can draw a more accurate conclusion.