Immediately after the film ended I thought to myself, 'that would have been so much more interesting if they had just left off that whole last scene'.
It was a classic case of the Hollywood tidy ending, the feel good ending, the everything is in it's right place so I can feel comfortable now ending.
Why not the ambiguous ending that keeps us scratching our heads and talking and guessing?
Am I the only one who feels this way?
Mud was like a prisoner to the love he held in. Throughout the entire film, we are shown that. He lives like a prisoner, thinks like a prisoner, even eats like one. Because of this delusional love he is disabled and not himself, he has turned into a man of lies. Once he decides to face the truth at the climax of the film, he becomes free and this is how we see him for the last time, something we and the characters all wanted for him - freedom.
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I think this was a case where I was delighted that the character lived and there was that happy ending, I cared so much about that character. I love ambiguous and unhappy endings but it's almost come to the point where have a happy ending is the unpredictable thing to do. This movie really blew me away, can't wait to watch it again.
shareAt first, I agreed with a lot of you when I saw the ending. Great movie, but the ending was too predictable. After I read a couple of comments, I've changed my mind. When you look at the ending like "Inbuchanan" says, you were just waiting for him to die. It was inevitable; the bounty hunters were non-stop shooting at him ... how couldn't he die!?! BUT, I never thought that if you get your heartbroken, the sun WILL rise the next day. Which is exactly what did happen. Someone else said that it would have been cool if Mud had discovered he'd been bit, too. And, instead of him being shot, he would have had died from the bite. That would have been a great ending, too. However it ended or could have ended, I loved it, and thanks for making me not be so close-minded. I thought when it was over,"thanks for ruining the ending, which ruined the whole movie". I don't think that anymore! The ending was just fine the way it was-I'm glad he lived.
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For the last 15 years or so, the "leave everyone guessing" ending has been the trend. The "feel good" ending is a fresh thing nowadays.
Having seen Jeff Nichols last film, I was expecting this sort of ending, because in the last film too he ended the film in favor of the lead character.
shareI understand where you're coming from, but the thing is that 'open ending' is not always 'is the main character dead or not'. This has become a rather common theme but not every film has to follow it. In Mud, a real tidy Hollywood ending would have consisted of most of/all of these elemetns:
- Mud and Juniper getting back together
- Ellis's parents staying together.
- Ellis and his family still living in their riverside home.
- Ellis getting together with May Pearl, probably by performing one heroic feat or the other.
The ending that the film got is still open in that it leaves important questions like - will Mud make a new and better life for himself or will he fall back on old patterns? Keep in mind that Carver's father is still after him, and he's on the run from the law too. Also keep in mind his personality. A redemptive death would have actually been as much a cliche as a total happy ending; what we got was an optimistic ending, and I think that fit the style of this film perfectly. An ambiguous 'dead or not' ending often works well, but not for every film.
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You're right, i felt good about that ending :)
But that's not just because he was ok an all, it's because the director truly gave us characters that we could get really AFRAID of what might have happened to them.
That's some great cinema right before your eyes, the best kind.
I agree with you, even if the 1st viewing I kind of thought the ending could have been better.
Then I re-watched it and realized the ending catered to the director/writers theme of getting knocked down by love...."then you get back up and get your tip wet....you know what I'm saying" -Michael Shannon
You're not a writer Fink, you're a goddamn write off