The ending - The Master (2012) Discussion

[–] rebeldeditados 11 years ago

You mean, the "good savage" has already been saved by the dogma?

reply

[–] jimmyr5595 11 years ago

That's not how I interpreted it. I interpreted it as Quell finding a tiny bit of peace despite knowing that he had been after a falsehood both with Dodd's religion and the friendship he had offered. It was like the sand woman. It satisfied his needs in the mind, but it wasn't real in the end.

But I suppose it could be interpreted as Quell never being able to find closure with the world. One makes up things like the sand woman to satisfy themselves, but it's temporary.

reply

[–] irishaspaddyspig 11 years ago

The scene at the end, fo me, reinforced how he had moved forward from how he was at the beginning.
His relationship with Dodd helped him.

"a malcontent who knows how to spell"

reply

[–] jimmyr5595 11 years ago

This is why the average person doesn't get this movie. They want clear cut answers and don't want to think of their own.

I like your interpretation as well.

reply

[–] irishaspaddyspig 11 years ago

True.
This film requires an investment by the viewer. It isn't mindless entertainment. I think that's why it is even better on subsequent viewings.

"a malcontent who knows how to spell"

reply

[–] therefdotcom 11 years ago

This film requires an investment by the viewer.

this film was ok. nevertheless, saying that it was hard to get is an insult to ordinary people. this is a lynch film, if you catch my drift.

"laugh and the world laughs with you. Weep and you weep alone." - Dae-su Oh

reply

[–] FredMcLovin 10 years ago

Interesting theory!

My thought about the sand lady is that at the end, Freddie understand, through his journey with Dodd, that you can be happy or comfortable with anything as long as you believe in it. He was comfortable in the sand as much as he was with the real woman.

I also said in another thread that this movie was about us always looking out for facts, but just believing or hoping can be a lot stronger than being exposed to facts. I think it's what PTA wanted to say when the lady says that she hope she had another life.

---------
Paul Thomas Anderson must be god ?!

reply

[–] mmaggiano 10 years ago

I am baffled by how you could have possibly jumped to this conclusion, rebeldeditados.

reply

[–] rallyinthestreets 10 years ago

Hah, I was just about to say the same thing.

reply

[–] daddie0 10 years ago

I would say the ending was ubiquitous. At first glance (to me) it looked like Freddie has finally found some peace...the comfort of a "real" woman. But then if you step back and notice the sequence, in the middle of fulfilling his desires he becomes the "master" and starts using The Cause on this woman-from-a-bar. He gives her platitudes ("you're the bravest woman I know..."), and perhaps in the end, we see that even here with his "objective" met, it is but false comfort for the transcendent needs Freddie struggles to resolve.

I agree with you: great ending.

reply

[–] deschreiber 10 years ago

The ending was so simple and quick that it's hard to accept that, after years of deep involvement in the cult, even running to England at Dodd's call, Freddie finds everything resolved in a pickup girls in an English pub. There's absolutely no proportion between problem and solution.

However, to address your comment—yes, Freddie does try a bit of mind control with the woman, mimicking the mental games of Dodd. But how seriously are we to take that? He only gets a few rote lines out before they collapse together in laughter. It's not exactly as if he's on his way to founding a new cult of his own. I think we're meant to see him as finding a way to sanity through a more normal relationship. But that's only to say that the movie is a terrible piece of pretentious muck.

reply

[–] olliemankz 10 years ago

I liked the ending in that I felt it told me that Freddie had moved past Dodd, and that Dodd had in his way helped Freddie, not that I'm sure Freddie had needed all that much help. Freddie probably would have gone through a few more semi-violent episodes and jail stays but eventually straightened out especially if he had had "the help of a good woman," a popular but probably often true notion.

When Freddie cried when visiting Dodd for the last time, that tipped me with the succeeding scenes that he had made the only wise choice ... to part from Dodd. The pub girl I did not see as a prostitute but just as someone who was in the right spot at the right time and was probably going to enjoy a romance with Freddie, possibly for a long time. If anything, to me the shot in the sand suggested that what Freddie really needed was love, and that that was what he had been running away from; and, really, how unrealistic was that? I'm not sure Doris would ultimately have given him the time of day, but he did what many a young man probably does, go off and live his life and then go back and see if the girl of his dreams waited for him. So she didn't, she wasn't the right one. Also, I don't think the beach shot has to be taken as in sequence. There was a lot of jumping around timeline-wise in the movie, and that shot seemed to me to have been taken when Freddie and his Navy buddies built the sand woman. I did feel ultimately heartened that Freddie rose above Dodd and he might only have gotten waylaid there because Freddie was really the master. He was the master of mixing drinks the likes of which were a revelation and a religion in and of themselves. And he eventually became, or maybe always was, the master of himself.

P.S. If you liked this one, you might also like Jimmy P. with Benicio Del Toro, which might also still be on Netflix. It is interesting how sometimes similarly themed movies come out at the same time, or maybe one copies the other; only in Jimmy P., the main character really does seem to have a mental issue. I'm still finishing Jimmy P. but it is also a throwback in time designed excellently.

reply

[–] 10 years ago

[deleted]

[–] olliemankz 10 years ago

Hmmm ... interesting analysis. I went back and looked at that of which you speak and remember that I took the telephone call in the theater as actually that Freddie was working in Hollywood; but if that is so, then I can almost ask if the director wasn't saying something about himself, that he himself could have been/was part of and grew because of a cult at one time. He also could have been saying, I am not above this, nor is anyone. At any rate, I did take that part of the movie literally but you make a good point.

reply

[–] clickbait 10 years ago

I think the ending was a dream...everything after he drove away with the motorcycle is a dream.

~If the realistic details fails, the movie fails~

reply

[–] 10 years ago

[deleted]

[–] 10 years ago

[deleted]

[–] seanson1 10 years ago

Not a bad theory. Everything is subjective, especially the lives of characters we see in a film, where moments are cherry-picked and conveyed through the particular vision of the director. I think most audiences overestimate the director, and most directors underestimate the audience. It takes an auteur to present scenes with an even hand and refrain from judging his own characters with his deliberate and omnipotent (within the confines of the film) choices.

Anyway, I'm not sure if "ubiquitous" was the best word. Dubious? Ambiguous? You almost lost me there.

reply

[–] SinJinQLA 10 years ago

I felt sad for Freddy when he is having sex with the girl in the pub. Sad because as he pretends processing with the girl, he sounds like an idiot (to me) and has no idea what processing is even about - he is just repeating what he's heard, with a big, dumb grin on his face. If Dodd was on one side of the spectrum, a master at processing, then Freddy is at the other end, without a clue. BUT, at the same time, when I watched this scene, I also felt a bit envious of Freddy. He is having the time of his life in bed with this girl, in some tiny room, with no plans, no responsibilities. And he's just enjoying the moment. It felt like he came full circle. The cause confused him and twisted him up, but in the end he untwists and becomes his old self. It actually reminds me a bit of A Clockwork Orange. Obviously not in tone but more in the story.

reply