Not all filmmakers like their movies to have
simple endings. Some leave their last scenes ambiguous to keep audiences thinking. But
sometimes that plan backfires, resulting in endings that are just plain confusing. Beware
of spoilers... Inception Christopher Nolan's 2010 film left audiences'
minds spinning as much as the top in the final shot. Just when it looks like the top is about
to spin out and tumble, the screen cuts to black. The final shot shows Dom Cobb reuniting
with his kids. But we never know if it's really happening or if it's a dream. Fans debated
the scene endlessly for years after Inception came out...but according to Nolan, the non-ending
is actually kind of the whole point. In 2015, the director gave the commencement
speech at Princeton University, and told the grads to "chase their reality." He used the
ending of Inception as an example, saying: "[Cobb] was off with his kids, he was in his
own subjective reality. He didn't really care anymore, and that makes a statement: perhaps,
all levels of reality are valid. The camera moves over the spinning top just before it
appears to be wobbling, it was cut to black." In short, the ending of the movie is up to
us — and we're right either way. The Dark Knight Rises The ending to Nolan's Dark Knight trilogy
isn't quite as vague as Inception, but it still left viewers debating after the credits
started rolling. After flying a nuclear bomb out of Gotham City, Batman escapes the blast...off-screen.
We know this because, later, while Alfred is in Florence, he sees Bruce Wayne sitting
at a table, enjoying a meal with ex-Catwoman Selina Kyle. Some fans have theorized that
this is all a dream — that Batman actually died in the explosion, and that Alfred simply
imagined seeing his friend taking in the Italian sunshine. But that's bat-baloney. Before the movie's
end, we learn along with Lucius Fox that Wayne fixed the Bat-plane's autopilot six months
before the final showdown in Gotham. That's all the exposition necessary for viewers to
know that Batman jumped out while the plane flies the bomb toward the bay. And sure, when Alfred sees Wayne in Florence,
it's exactly how Alfred describes it earlier in the film. But that's not a dream — it's
just the best way for Wayne to show Alfred he's alive. Moreover, Selina Kyle is there,
wearing Wayne's mother's necklace, which she steals at the beginning of the movie. Alfred
doesn't know she and Wayne have become an item, and he'd already quit working for Bruce
before Batman and Catwoman teamed up to save Gotham City. As if all that isn't enough, Christian Bale
himself thinks that Bruce is alive by the end of the movie. He explained during an interview
while promoting Exodus: Gods and Kings: "He was just content with me being alive and
left because that was always the life that he wanted for him. And I find it very interesting
and with most films, I tend to say ‘It’s what the audience thinks it is.’ My personal
opinion? No, it was not a dream. That was for real and he was just delighted that finally
he had freed himself from the privilege, but ultimately the burden of being Bruce Wayne." None of this matters anyway. Batfleck is the
wave of the future! But let's shift our gaze toward the ghost of Batman's past... Birdman Alejandro G. Iñárritu's film about a washed-up
actor trying to make a comeback on Broadway has the kind of weird ending that puts Inception
to shame. Throughout the film, Riggan Thomas Thomson is shown as having superpowers, only
to have them later be explained as being all in his head. In the final scene, Riggan's
daughter Sam enters his hospital room to find his bed empty and the window open. Sirens
and voices can be heard coming from the street below. Initially, Sam looks down, but she
slowly turns her head up to the sky and she smiles. Some might think this means Riggan
actually does have powers, and has flown away. But...probably not. What really seems to have
happened is that Riggan has successfully committed suicide, which he failed to do on the previous
day. Sam, for her part, seems to start hallucinating just like her dad. The fact that she has bird
tattoos on her arm and that her father played a superhero with bird-based powers suggests
the strong connection between the two. Sam seems to leave the real world to enter a fantasy
where her father is still alive, soaring above the clouds. The film is subtitled The Unexpected
Virtue of Ignorance, after all. Here, Sam chooses to ignore reality. One of Birdman's four screenwriters, Alexander
Dinelaris Jr., hinted during an interview with HuffPost Live that the key to their understanding
of the ending lies within Sam's relationship with her father: "I think when we found the relationship with
the daughter, we started to understand what Riggan’s story was. Once she got down, Emma’s
big monologue, in the basement, we started to understand the relationship and what it
was. We’re not going to sit around and explain the ending." Vanilla Sky Instead of a feelgood romance or a fun coming-of-age
story, viewers of Vanilla Sky got a moody, elliptical remake of a hit Spanish film. A
feckless playboy suffers near-death and disfigurement after a relationship with his new girlfriend
plunges his ex into homicidal obsession. But once his face is surgically restored, his
life really starts to go haywire. Viewers are told that much of what they've
seen is a lucid dream in Cruise's brain, which has been held in a cryogenic stasis for more
than 100 years. The more troubling elements of the narrative are apparently the result
of a glitch. He's given the choice to either reboot the dream or exit it once and for all
by jumping off a building and being brought back to life. He jumps — and the last shot
is of the protagonist opening his eyes, starting his life over again. Director Cameron Crowe said that the correct
answer to understanding the movie might just be accepting what you see onscreen as the
actual events of the story, according to his comments on the DVD's commentary track. Crowe
seemed to lean in that direction while talking with Film School Rejects about the film's
unused alternate ending as well, saying: "You want people to understand what you're
going for, so the question is, looking at both endings: Did the pendulum swing too much
in the direction of us explaining stuff? I think it did. The original ending was more
open-ended, a little less explained." Barton Fink At the end of this Coen Brothers flick, tortured
writer Barton Fink wanders onto a beach, where he meets a woman resembling the picture decorating
his sparse, depressing hotel room. Shortly after they meet, the movie abruptly ends,
potentially leaving some viewers scratching their heads. What's it mean? Here's one way
to look at it. The picture represents the idea of Hollywood.
It's a place of fantasy, beaches, and beautiful women. Meanwhile, throughout the entire film,
Fink is subjected to the reality of Hollywood. He's had his script torn apart by an executive.
He found out his hero, writer W. P. Mayhew is a washed-up alcoholic, and that Mayhew's
wife writes his novels for him. And he's fled from both a burning hotel and a shotgun-wielding
maniac. “Ahhhh! Ahhhh!” You'd think that finally finding the woman
on the beach would mean that Fink is at the end of his trials, having reached his reward
and a place where he feels safe. But in fact, he's learned the truth about the dangerous
world in which he now exists. Joel Coen explained in a 1991 interview: "Some people have suggested that the whole
second part of the film is nothing but a nightmare. But it was never our intention to, in any
literal sense, depict some bad dream, and yet it is true that we were aiming for a logic
of the irrational. We wanted the film's atmosphere to reflect the psychological state of the
protagonist." That wouldn't be the last time the ending
of a Coen brothers movie left audiences debating after leaving the theater... No Country For Old Men At the end of this blood-soaked neo-Western,
Sheriff Ed Tom Bell tells his wife about two dreams he has about his father. In the first
dream, he loses some money his father gave him. In the second dream, Bell sees his father
holding a torch, riding ahead into the darkness of a snowy mountain pass. Shortly before Bell tells the stories of his
dreams, he tells his wife that his father died young. That, in a sense, his father will
always be a younger man. More importantly, throughout the movie, Bell ponders the violence
in the area where he's sheriff. And since he's close to retirement, he wonders whether
he's too old for the world. The title of the movie is No Country For Old Men, and Bell
is one of them. It's become too violent too quickly for someone of his age, and he can
no longer cope. The world needs someone younger, like his father, to light the way in the ever-growing
darkness around it — exactly like the second dream Bell describes. As for the first dream? Maybe Bell just needs
a new wallet. Mulholland Drive David Lynch fans don't watch his work for
straightforward narratives. But even in the context of his endearingly weird filmography,
2001's Mulholland Drive is tough to figure out. Lynch himself has steadfastly refused
to help untangle the movie, which moves in jittery circles around an actress, a mysterious
woman, and a film director…all of whom are mixed up in a dreamlike and frequently nonsensical
series of events. Ultimately, the film's ending is every bit
as open to interpretation as the rest of the film — and although viewers are welcome
to delve into the many theories attempting to explain what Lynch might have meant, the
best explanation was arguably posed by the late film critic Roger Ebert. According to
him, "The movie is hypnotic; we're drawn along
as if one thing leads to another but nothing leads anywhere, and that's even before the
characters start to fracture and recombine like flesh caught in a kaleidoscope. There
is no explanation. There may not even be a mystery." So what's the explanation here? Uh...pretty
much whatever you want. “You’re welcome!” Thanks for watching! Click the Looper icon
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