Monday, September 19, 2011
Episode 2 - Twist Ending Movies
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As you would probably expect from the episode's theme, this podcast contains spoilers for The Usual Suspects, Seven, Fallen, The Mist, The Wicker Man, Soylent Green, Planet of the Apes, Psycho and The Others. Though I'd take a bet you probably already know how at least half of those end.
I just happened to see this article today: Apparently Brad Pitt made sure they didn't change Seven's ending.
Others we didn't have time to discuss but still recommend are: Donnie Darko, Identity, Memento, The Prestige, and The Orphanage.
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Here's the thing about SEVEN... He isn't talking to god. He isn't punishing these individual people for their sins. Like Morgan Freeman's character, John Doe is just disgusted with how far the city has fallen so he's giving it a wakeup call in a way that's so shocking that nobody will forget it. Brad Pitt's character will neither get the death penalty nor rot in an asylum. His fate is to live with the knowledge that, by giving in to wrath and pulling the trigger, he let the killer win. It wasn't about killing people, it was about proving a point, about forcing the city to face its own darkness by pushing it to the furthest extreme.
ReplyDeleteI wouldn't say THE MIST is a twist ending. It's a shock ending. A twist ending makes you look back over the entire film and re-evaluate everything you thought you knew. THE MIST is just a shock. It's a good shock, but I agree that it doesn't work because the characters weren't pushed far enough to believably go there.
What's this about the PSYCHO remake? ;)
Finally, someone else who enjoyed IDENTITY!
I'll admit out of all of the movies we discussed, Seven is the one I haven't seen in a long time. So it's entirely possible I was getting the details a little mixed up.
ReplyDeleteWell we do see that the woman who left very early was able to go and get her kids and be rescued... so that sort of calls back to the beginning. But I'll agree it is more shock than anything else. In that case, I would say Fallen is mostly a shock film too.
I totally thought of I Hate/Love Remakes the second Bethany mentioned the Psycho remake. :)
Do people not like Identity? I can't see why. I thought it was a decent ensemble cast, a decent mystery, a great shocking twist in the middle, and another little twist that makes you laugh wickedly at the end.
Ditto on not having seen Se7en in a while, it was probably why we were kind of going back and forth on it.
ReplyDeleteI will assert that I think Fallen vaguely counts as a twist ending because of that voice over at the beginning. You watch the whole film under the impression that the good guy makes it, which is why the ending is what it is. (What it is: Cheatyface.)
I Hate/Love Remakes didn't occur to me until I was listening to the podcast the other day.
I still haven't seen FALLEN. It's one of those films that always looked a bit interesting, but I never got around to it.
ReplyDeleteThe PSYCHO remake is a strange, strange thing.
Syrin...
When I bring up IDENTITY, most people have never seen it, and those who have shrug it off as predictable and underwhelming. I was blown away by it. I love how, even after we find out the truth of who these characters are, there's still stakes and a reason to want one to triumph.
Also, it was written by the guy who wrote and directed JACK FROST.