Films that start well and end terribly

Manchild

10-05-14

Originally Posted by windsoc

The Mist - I didn't particularity like this film from the beginning, some of the stereotypes were so bad I was expecting Basil Exposition to come on screen and say "did you get that? You understand this person is racist right?!" but I had to watch it to review it for another website. Now I am not even going to bother typing out the ending because I do not feel the film deserves that much respect of me but the end was just such an anticlimax and I just came away thinking "and?? Is that it?! Am I missing something here or was that just dumb?" I don't think, I was missing anything, I know what the ending representing but it just made me feel numb, at best it made me feel blah and for me that it just not good enough.

To date this remains the movie with the most shocking ending that I've ever seen. Personally, I think that counts for something.

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nirvana94

Registered User

11-16-14

The matrix (from first to last movie anyways)

Iroquois

Welcome to the human race...

11-16-14

Originally Posted by windsoc

The Book of Eli - the thing I don't get about the ending is that it just didn't make any sense to me as to why it could have been the case throughout the entire film. I have taken a lot of stick for my reason but others have started to agree with me, again, I will put it in spoilers why.

WARNING: "The Book of Eli" spoilers below

Okay, so the big spoiler, the guy was blind all along, we didn't know that and frankly I didn't care. Now here is my so techy it hurts reason. Eli at one stage needs to charge his iPod, we are shown the iPod to let us know it is low on power and we need to know this so that we know that power is scarce and something that is not easy to get hold of. This model iPod (one of the originals) did not make any sound to indicate that the battery level was low or dead so he had no idea what the state of said iPod is, it could have been stepped on and the hard drive could have been damaged for all he knew yet he didn't ask, somehow he just knew the power supply was drained. How? How would he know that?? I know it is a small thing to let bug me but as a techy these things annoy me when it so blatant that it does not make sense.

WARNING: "The Book of Eli" spoilers below

Perhaps he just knows to charge his iPod every time he enters a new town that's big enough to have its own engineer. Even if he couldn't see the "power off" screen on the iPod, the fact that it wouldn't play music would probably be all the indication he needed that it needed recharging. If it was seriously damaged, he would probably just have to wait until the engineer he visited told him so.

The more bothersome plot hole that his blindness causes is the fact that a copy of the Bible written entirely in Braille would actually take up thirty-nine whole books that were the same size as the single book he carries around with him the whole time. This just makes the fact that he is able to recite the whole thing from memory even more implausible/impressive.

As for my pick for a good movie that went off the rails towards the end - Zodiac. A solid detective drama for the first hour and a half but after...

WARNING: "Zodiac" spoilers below

everyone but Jake Gyllenhaal's character gives up on the case

...it just becomes a struggle to stay invested. Sure, it was probably making some point about the dangers of obsession, but it didn't do it well enough to justify that really sluggish final hour.

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Originally Posted by Yoda

I really just want you all angry and confused the whole time.

Iro's Top 100 Movies v3.0

Gatsby

Master of My Domain

11-16-14

M. Night. Sh*tmalan's The Village.

Classer

Registered User

11-17-14

Likewise to Unbreakable, the twist was already far-fetched and text-on-screen was a flat resolution.

Gideon58

Registered User

11-18-14

This question has appeared on these boards in various reincarnations for several months now but I will answer again in case this is a new poster. When it comes to a movie that I love but hate the ending, the first thing that pops into my head is No Country for Old Men...the ending is ambiguous and just kind of peters out and leaves a bad taste in my mouth for the rest of the movie, which works.

Friendly Mushroom!

Mushy Giant Friend!

11-18-14

Just about every film in my overrated list.

http://www.movieforums.com/community...ight=overrated

Gideon58

Registered User

11-19-14

Originally Posted by jal90

Funnily enough, the three films based on Stephen King stories I've watched (The Shawshank redemption, The mist and Dolores Claiborne) actually do get improved with their endings.

I'd say Saving private Ryan. It may not be an exaggerated case, but after 20 minutes of non-stop, genuinely tense and well-directed action, the storyline becomes stretched, the discourse gets rather simple and one-sided and the character design doesn't really help to get an emotional attachment to the story.

I loved Delores Claiborne...rock solid film adaptation of a King story.

Gideon58

Registered User

11-19-14

Originally Posted by Sonny Wortzik

Shutter Island

Terminator 2

The Matrix Reloaded

War of the Worlds

Kill Bill 2

Knowing

Indiana Jones 4

Big second to War of the Worlds if you're talking about the Steven Spielberg/Tom Cruise version...the ending is just stupid and I wasn't crazy about the rest of the movie either, if the truth be told.

Gideon58

Registered User

11-19-14

Originally Posted by McConnaughay

I think The Departed started tremendously, one of my favorite movies ever, but it starts going downhill towards the end, in a very big way.

I wouldn't say that the ending of The Departed was bad, I just feel that after what had already unfolded in terms of story, the ending wasn't what I wanted it to be, but not necessarily bad...you know, like Rhett leaving Scarlett at the end of Gone with the Wind...we didn't really want him to leave her, but we understand why he did.

90sAce

Registered User

11-19-14

WARNING: """ spoilers below

Django Unchained didn't end terribly, but it definitely went downhill. I mentioned this in a review of the film - but Christoph Waltz deciding to shoot Leonardo DiCaprio really made no sense, because not only did he lose his life but he nearly got Django and his wife killed in the process (despite having worked so hard to win their freedom up until that point). The tone after this point in the movie also changed sharply from a more serious film, to a cheesier "Pulp Fiction" type film and definitely felt out of place."

Another one that comes to mind is Smokin' Aces - the first half of the film had a stylized "Pulp Fiction" flair - then about halfway though the film they tried give it an overly serious tone with a melodramatic musical score that didn't fit the theme at all. They also left several loose ends untied.

Not to mention, pretty much every horror/slasher film, with how they always bring the killer back to life at the end, or have the killer turn out to be someone other than expected - and end up destroying the continuity or the mystery that they'd spent the entire film establishing. Plus it's no longer even a surprise to the audience anymore, since it's been done to death for the last 30-40 years.

90sAce

Registered User

11-19-14

Originally Posted by Sonny Wortzik

Terminator 2

I'd say Terminator 3 is definitely worse in the ending department - since it undid most of the continuity that had been established in the previous film. (Up until that point the films had presented the theme that Judgment Day could be prevented by altering events in the past; then all of a sudden John Connor learns that it's been predestined to happen all along).

mark_trapp

Registered User

11-20-14

The "13" movie with 50 cent.

UV_Entries

University Video Entries

12-21-14

The Cabin in the Woods

SohoDriver

Registered User

12-21-14

I loved the first half of From Dusk Till Dawn but wasn't crazy about the vampire section.

The Ryan Gosling section of The Place Beyond the Pines is stunning and beautifully raw. The rest of the film is still good but it becomes less and less cohesive, especially in the 3rd act.

90sAce

Registered User

12-21-14

Saw: The Final Chapter had a pretty awful ending twist. It wasn't actually revealed in the film, but the film's creators announced that the 2 new masked Jigsaw apprentices are the Brad and Ryan characters (a couple of comic relief characters at the start of the film). If they actually make it into the sequel it will be stupid beyond belief.

mlaturno

Registered User

12-22-14

The Purge had a pretty solid (maybe a little sophomoric, but hey) first half. High concept with some interesting characters. Totally fell apart in the last third. It was like the writers couldn't think of an ending so they just threw together five seconds from every ****** horror ending ever and mashed it all together. Like the frankenstein's monster of ****** cliches.

mlaturno

Registered User

12-22-14

Originally Posted by 90sAce