Endings

I watched this movie last night. It's the kind of movie I love, filled with twists and turns and noirish shades of good and evil. The reviews had been good, it had good people in it (having the next James Bond didn't hurt any) and I had been looking forward to seeing it.

And, all things considered, it lived up to my expectations. The story was great, filled with wonderful dialogue (although the English and the Irish sometimes tend to swallow their words so you have to listen closely or used subtitles, if you have them), lots of plot twists (some of them shocking and some a little confusing - you might have to watch it a couple of times to feel like you caught everything) and, as every noir film should have, a wonderfully dishy female.

All in all, the film was a wonderful ride and I enjoyed it immensely. Right up til the ending. Now, if you haven't seen the movie, I'm not going to give anything away (no spoilers!) but for me, the ending completely changed my feelings about it. Up til that point, this was a movie I wanted to own and watch again and again. And suddenly, it became one of those movies where you say "Okay, I've seen it and I liked it but I don't need to see it again".

Now, you want to hear something crazy? The ending is perfect. It's fully justified by the events of the story and it works beautifully; in a dark, convoluted movie like this one, it's a twist you should see coming but don't (or at least, I didn't). So why did it change everything for me?

Because it's not the ending I wanted.

In his wonderful book Adventures in the Screen Trade, William Goldman says rather succinctly, "Endings, frankly, are a bitch". In the same book, Paul Newman says that the last fifteen minutes are the most important in a movie, meaning, I think, that the ending ultimately determines whether you will or won't like a movie. Endings are what create good or bad word of mouth. In this case, my word of mouth would be to rent or watch it, if dark, noirish stuff is your kind of movie. And then I'd ask you to tell me what you thought. But you won't find it in my DVD case at home.

And maybe that says more about me than it does the movie.