It’s been a lot time since I did a movie list… and I was watching movies earlier this week & thought I’d start one up… so behold…
Movie Endings That REALLY Felt Incomplete
There’s a difference between movies feeling incomplete… and leaving for interpretation. Films like “Reservoir Dogs”, “In Bruges”, “Inception”, “Total Recall”, “French Connection”, “The Italian Job” and a few others leave the endings ambiguous for the viewer to decide what happens… but these are more movies that had a lot of pretty obvious questions that weren’t answered… or just forgot to make sequels for… or some even made sequels but completely forgot a few things along the way. Anyway, these were just a few that I thought of the other day when thinking about the subject… but I know that I’ve forgotten a few. By the way, spoiler alerts… since we’re talking about movie endings… but yeah…
• Goonies (1985) – Okay, this was the one that started the thought the other night… and I know they’re allegedly doing a sequel 30 years later or whatever… but at the end of the movie… even as a kid, my thought was “Okay, there’s a marble bag full of (fake-looking) precious stones left from the ship. Is that going to be enough to buy all of the houses back? I’m not sure what property values are in 1985 Astoria, Oregon but… I’m not 100% sure that’s all going to be handled in 24 hours and/or that’ll cover all of the neighborhood. Especially if you have to sell in a hurry! Also, if they’re stinking rich now somehow… do they want to stay there? All of them? Obviously they weren’t doing too well before so they may have some crippling debt to pay off first… or at the least bank liens. Also, where the f**k is the ship going? Out to see like an abandoned Russian cruise ship? Somebody’s going to after that, right? I mean… the kids just said they got a pocketful of these precious stones worth millions… and that was a drop in the pond of that floating money bin! Is the guy who’s making the golf course going to go after it? He probably has a boat… the coast guard? Why the f**k not? It’s a floating fortune. Roll credits? Are you serious right now?” So yeah… glimpse into the world of young $teve… before he learned about his own One-Eyed Willie… but then again, I also think that the years around 1985 were basically the Golden Era of Movies with shows like Back to the Future, Goonies, Rocky IV, Romancing the Stone, Ghostbusters, Revenge of the Nerds & so on…
• Rocky III (1982) – Speaking of the Rocky series… the original is a classic… number two was pretty good too despite being thrown together willy-nilly… the third one was where it started getting a little campy… but Clubber Lang (Mr. T) was a f**king BEAST!!! Okay, quick summary of the movie. Rocky’s champ & his rival from the first two movies Apollo Creed (Carl Weathers) has retired. Along comes this f**king badass boxer from Detroit named Clubber Lang… and he’s just destroying cats. He’s also about the greatest self-promoter in the history of boxing by just showing up at news conferences & talking trash to Rocky… making lewd comments at his woman… and basically pushes his manager Mick which… I guess incidentally led to his death in a way? Anyway, Rocky fights Clubber… and gets beaten like a mule. Clubber is the champion. Mick is dead. Rocky is bummed. Well, Apollo Creed steps in and says “I’ll be your manager and teach you to fight like me… it’s the only chance you’ve got.” Rocky says something back in mumbled gibberish but it’s basically “Okay.” They train… montages… rematch… more trash talking… Rocky eventually wins the rematch… orchestra plays… roll credits. Rocky IV comes out two years later… and CLUBBER LANG IS NEVER MENTIONED AGAIN!!! What… how is there not a 3rd bout? That’s what the boxing world is based on!!! Selling the rematch!!! That was the whole premise of Rocky II!!! Did Clubber Lang just retire from boxing to go work on an assembly line in Detroit? F**K NO!!! Absolute worst-case scenario: He’s the #1 contender for another decade, making millions of dollars fighting others INCLUDING the rematches with Rocky Balboa, collects them checks and then at the ripe old age of 38, died from a cocaine overdose in the company of several Brazilian supermodels in his mansion. That’s the movie I want to see. Now, Rocky IV was a classic in its own right… but think of it, even with the addition of Ivan Drago (Dolph Lundgren), Clubber is #2 contender… and I’d personally LOVE to see that match-up of Clubber vs. Drago!!! Wouldn’t you??? That’s the sh*t that needs to happen, Hollywood!!! You’re welcome!!!
• Over the Top (1987) – Speaking of Stallone movies… I understand that this movie was kind a half-ass thrown-together movie about professional arm wrestling where they paid a LOT of money for Stallone to play Lincoln Hawk, whose basically an absent father & then when the mother is close to death (Disney disease?) then he has a chance to impress his son… by being the best arm wrestler in the world. Okay, that’s… a premise. The thing is… at the end of the movie, he’s won the title… and apparently he bet on himself… not sure if that’s really legal… but then, did we forget the scene where he drove his semi truck through the front yard & fountain of his child’s wealthy grandparents? I just felt like… consequences were coming from that at the end of the movie because… silly me, I think they should… and Robert Loggia doesn’t forgive easily. Oh well… it’s just a horrible movie.
• Next (2007) – So basically from the mid-80’s my remembered movie list jumps about twenty years to the next batch where they seemed to have forgotten endings. Now, I understand this Nicolas Cage / Jessica Biel flick was based on a notion by Philip K. Dick as many great sci-fi movies are… even if they’re not really futuristic sci-fi. Basically Nicolas Cage is a guy who can see a few minutes into the future, so he can see hundreds of possible scenarios & pick the best one… the government finds out… and now he’s on a mission to find a nuclear bomb before it goes off. He does a good job… and they find the bomb… then the credits roll. I… okay? What about the people who stole the bomb? Are we going after them now? I just seem to remember this movie ending with Nicolas Cage walking off, I think to go find them… and the credits rolling like “Is… Is that it?” Now, there were a few movies around this time that were supposed to have sequels like Jumper (2008) & Eragon (2006) but because they sucked so bad, the movies just left on little cliffhangers… but I’m not sure if Next was one of those movies… anyway, interesting concept but it just left me wanting at the end. Especially with the possibilities of sequel titles… like Next 2 (next to what?)… the Next Next… the Final Next… The Next Problem… The Sequel to Next… I don’t know… maybe that’s why they didn’t do it.
• Death Proof (2007) – I’ve mentioned this before back when I watched the movie for the first time… but after sticking around through the end credits of this movie to see what was going to happen when the three heroines of this movie returned with a completely trashed Dodge Challenger to Jasper’s home in the backwoods of Lebanon, Kentucky. Alas, there was no resolution in this Tarantino masterpiece… but perhaps that was his intention… to let the viewer picture their own ending… or in my case, sequel.
• No Country for Old Men (2007) – GREAT flick… kind of an ambiguous ending… I don’t know, it just seemed like a weird point to stop & roll the credits, right? Eh, I guess that’s why I’m not a professional critic. I don’t have enough training in nuance & a bunch of terms for film that if they really mattered, there wouldn’t be a minimum of four Transformer movies or SEVEN Fast & Furious flicks.
• Zodiac (2007) – I REALLY hate to question the merciful ending of a three-hour borefest like this movie… but yeah, after three hours of… this movie… it just kind of ends. What happens? What was learned? Not a whole hell of a lot… except I’m at least three hours older now… apparently it was just the thing to do in 2007 is leave your movie without a decent third act or any kind of resolution.
• 2001: Space Odyssey (1968) – Again… three hour flick… this one’s actually really f**king good too… amazing special effects by today’s standards let alone the 60’s… but after watching it, my initial response was “What’s up with the f**king baby? Is this a metaphor? Sigh… f**king Kubrick…” Now, I’m sure if I really wanted to, I could talk to a Kubrick expert… and delve into the genius that is Kubrick… and all the layers of his artwork… and get all the meanings that my simple mind might have missed in watching this flick (along with a few others he made) but to do that… I’d have to actually speak with a Kubrick expert… and the few that I’ve seen on television have steered me away from engaging in such conversation. So… barring I find a non-pretentious Kubrick expert… I’m just going to enjoy the overlying concepts of technology vs. nature, man’s path of self-destruction, logic vs. longing & all that crazy stuff… and just leave the Space Baby alone. I probably don’t want the answer anyway.
Did I forget any? Let me know…
Anyway, I’ll be back with more entries in a few days… this time probably beer related stuff and ACTUAL movie reviews. You’re welcome. Have a great day everybody!!!
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