An attempt to explain this movie/the ending (It's really happening)
First, let's just say that this film is not necessariy coherent or well-written, so 'explaining' it might be tricky. It certainly frustrates me---yet I also find this movie strangely compelling. I'd like to make a couple of points:
1) There seems to be a lot of thought on this board that the ending might not be real, but only happening in her head, and she's going crazy. That's absurd. In the context of the movie, the ENDING IS REAL. The actions of the other prisoners at the jail, and the sherriff she rides off with, are proof enough.
When the bars fall off the cells, it's obvious it's really happening. I think this viewpoint that it's a hallucination demonstrates some peoples' bias, that they just can't imagine it being true, even in a Hollywood movie! And it IS hard to accept that this director/writer would say at the end that the Rapture really turns out to be real, when as the movie goes on it's obvious he has an antiChristian bias.
2) So what was his point? At the end, she refuses the offer of Heaven, and refuses God. Her explanantion is pretty clear, and I think demonstrates what Tolkin was trying to say. She basically says if God's gift is Life, why should we thank Him when life is full of so much pain and suffering? This is an old argument against religious beliefs which is so weak I won't even try to answer it, but let's just say someone worked it out in the Book of Job about 3000 years ago. It's really not an argument all.
However, I admire one thing Tolkin did: he felt so strongly about sending this message, that he follows it through (using Rogers' character) by saying, that EVEN IF it was PROVEN to him that God was real-and that He was basically right there in front of Tolkin-he'd STILL refuse His offer of Heaven, he'd be so angry at God for the suffering on Earth! And I think it's this part of the movie that confuses people-they see that Rogers' character is meant to be unsympathetic and we're supposed to hate her for her beliefs.......so then how could the filmmaker go and make the Rapture seem real at the end of the movie?? Wouldn't that confirm her earlier beliefs?? I think you have to accept that it IS real, so I think he did that to make his argument stronger. He obviously feels that life is so bad, that if there IS a God, He deserves blame and anger, not love and obedience.
3) I'll end with this-I like how he took his feelings against a Christian God to a logical conclusion-that he'd reject Him even to his face. But I still have to say, that the argument he's making is a stupid one, and the portrayal of Christianity in this movie bears no resemblance to any kind of normal, mainstream Christianity. It's more like a portrayal of some cult, the kind that attract, what, 200 people or something, but get all the media coverage and warp peoples' views of what it truly means to follow Christ.
For our friendly Atheists out there, this would be like portraying your average atheist by having the character bomb a church.