I tend to be longsuffering with bad stories. It’s sad, I know. My “story filter” should allow me—even encourage me—to turn off terrible movies or put down awful books. But I don’t. I’m patient to a fault, which is just a self-complimentary way of saying, “I have to know how it ends!”
But what do you do when the ending fails to live up to the rest of the movie? Of course, this rarely ever happens; however, oddly enough, this is exactly how I’ve felt about the last two movies I’ve watched.
The first was Redbelt, David Mamet’s latest movie about a mixed martial arts fighting instructor. To begin, the dialogue in this movie is superb. It drives the plot forward, engagingly, all without giving away too much information too soon. And though the plot will feel familiar to anyone who’s watched Mamet’s earlier work, it’s still fresh: our hero is the lovable, down-and-out Mike Terry who’s fighting to watch out for his friends, uphold virtue, and convince his wife that he can be a provider.
To be fair, the ending doesn’t unravel the rest of the movie. If anything, it just doesn’t tie things up neatly enough. There are unanswered questions about characters, unresolved characters even, and the ending feels like it needed to be at least two-and-a-half minutes longer. I want to know what happened to the actor, I want to know what Terry will do next (it doesn’t feel like the end finishes his arc), and I want to know what happens with Emily Mortimer.
Still, I’m glad I watched it. If you haven’t, believe me, you could do worse.
In many ways The Visitor is perhaps the most compelling movie I’ve seen since I became infatuated with Hellboy II: The Golden Army. (High praise, eh?) Its plot is nothing groundbreaking (snarky old professor forced to learn how to live with and for others), but the dialogue is captivating. Richard Jenkins’s delivery is particularly compelling, even though he tends to speak slowly: in a way, he pushes you forward while still holding you back. Perfect, beautiful stuff.
But the movie’s climactic scene seems to unravel a few threads. It turns away from revealing character, revealing love, and spirals into an incredibly preachy monologue. “It’s not fair!” the professor yells at two disinterested bureaucrats. From there to the end, the movie undoes its good deeds: it breezily removes the UST that had dominated the screen for the last forty minutes, so breezily that you feel like you’re watching two lusty teenagers instead of two full-grown adults. (Is that real? Perhaps. But it destroys the flow of the film. Suddenly, what was about real love—self-sacrifice—dissolves into a rather unbelievable and unsatisfying moment of “passion.”)
Even the film’s closing scene, though touching, fails to satisfy. I was left wondering whether the Professor had learned anything at all, if he had really started a new way of life or had simply changed out his toys and scenery.
I won’t deny that I still enjoyed these films, but I have to admit that I’d rather a watch a terrible movie that ends well than a pretty good movie that doesn’t. The former type feels like a deathbed conversion, the kind that is undoubtedly a miracle and moves you to sing, “Hallelujah! Amen.” On the other hand, the latter—even while it has much to offer and teach—is like watching the end of the life of David, a man so full of hope and promise, who sees his family tear themselves apart and dies weak, out of touch with reality, noble and yet broken in a way that brings tears instead of song.
Great post. So I have to ask, what are some examples of terrible movies that end well?
Um. You did have to ask that.
Two immediately come to mind. (Please note that I am by no means recommending these movies: I merely found the endings apocalyptic.)
Aeon Flux and The Forgotten both end with an admission that there are some things (i.e. motherhood) that cannot be forgotten. When I saw them, those two things blew my mind.
(Like I said … )