Three Horror Movies that Stuck the Landing, Three that Wiffed It and How They Could Have Been Better--Nothing But Spoilers
Literally this entire post is spoilers. There.
There are many things that can cause disappointment in a horror movie. Cheesy acting. Gross-out cheap thrills. Bad special effects. But the one that always slays me (no pun intended) is when a movie is saying really interesting things and then falls completely apart in the last ten minutes, not because the monster looks disappointing to what you imagined (they often do), but because of a lack of thematic consistency. A good horror movie is always about the monsters that we experience in real life as much as those that lurk on screen; great horror movie finishes the job it started with some internal consistency.
Here are three horror movies that really stuck the landing, in no particular order, chosen at more-or-less random from my Saturday morning nap. I could have found others, but these sprung to mind as having particularly satisfying endings:
Night of the Living Dead
Theme: The individual, no matter how competent, is no match for the brainless masses.
Plot bearing this out: When a microcasm of personalities is trapped in a farmhouse, faced with the leagues of the undead, a power struggle for who gets to decide what to do breaks out. But despite a war of personalities inside, the thread outside is without personality. They are pajama-clad, naked, decomposing corpses with zero plan or coordination. And they're winning.
Nailed it: Although our hero, through his wits and courage, manages to survive the night, when the day dawns he is mistaken for a ghoul and shot in the head. And what gets him? A posse of slack-jawed yokels, roving through the countryside, shooting anything that moves, perfectly mirroring the mindlessness of the undead horde, and just as efficient.
A Quiet Place
Theme: It is really hard to protect and nurture family in the face of danger.
Plot bearing this out: Well, the characters right out say it, but even then, from the beginning, it is clear that children, from unborn infants to surly teenagers, are a liability in the face of a lurking destruction that confronts them all. But for all that, children are also a reason, the reason, to keep surviving. An elderly man whose wife is killed commits suicide in a scream. The Abbotts, on the other hand, teach their children not only how to survive in this new world, but how to care for each other in the process.
Nailed it: There is no more "protect and nurture" image than that of brother cradling baby while mom and sister double-team tormenting and shotgunning monsters to obliteration. The family has finally become able to be on the attack, not just sneaking around surviving, but becoming active heroes to actually save the world, which leads to...
10 Cloverfield Lane
Theme: You are stronger than you know, and you can fight harder than you think.
Plot bearing this out: Michelle survives, in order, a car accident, a madman, and freaky-deacky aliens. But all along the way, she doubts whether it wouldn't be easier just to stop fighting and die--or just settle into a banal comfort. After all, board games and tinned food isn't all that bad, especially when you're the favorite, right?
Nailed it: After doing whatever it takes to escape and just survive, Michelle, screeching down an empty road to get the heck out of dodge, hears on the radio that there are more monsters--and survivors-- down another road. She continues on her safe path a moment, then puts it in reverse, and goes speeding into danger to use her new fighting ability and confidence to help others.
***
And now for some horror movies that were doing so well, until they sucked it up in the last ten minutes or so. Again, just for emphasis, I don't mean "the monster was a little disappointing after all the hype" (1408, The Ritual, etc.) or even "it was internally consistent, but I wasn't wowed by their particular level of insight by the end" (Mama, Cabin in the Woods). This is full-blown "Wow, this movie is saying some really important things...oh, wait, no they just ruined everything."
The Last Exorcism
Theme: That classic of Greek theater: the hubris of man in the face of supernatural forces he doesn't understand.
Plot bearing this out: Rev. Cotton Mathis thinks his parishioners are patsies and has an even lower opinion of the folk to hire him to before exorcisms. In this mock documentary, Mathis gleefully lets the crew into his use of stereos, special effects and other modes of hoodwinking hillbillies as one last "screw you" before leaving the church. But this time Nell seems actually, factually possessed.
How they screwed it up: Literal Satan-worshipping hicks. Literal everybody dies. Literal "shaking found footage that you are supposed to believe was somehow saved so you can watch this film now" (THEN WHO WAS DOING ALL THE EDITING UP UNTIL THIS POINT?!)
How it should have ended: 2/3rds of the way, Mathis starts hearing voices telling him that if he literally sacrifices himself, the girl will be released. He doesn't know whether the voices are angels or demons, but he knows it doesn't come from the stereo. He kills himself in a ritual that does not look anything Southern Baptist, and dies horrified to think that he might be dragged down to hell, now that he is more convinced of the reality of the concept. The crew, mortified, tries to stop him, but it's too late. They have to struggle with their journalistic integrity and the horror of what they have witnessed. They're going to complete the documentary and dedicate it to his memory.
Lights Out
Theme: Mental illness affects whole families.
Plot bearing this out: A young woman, estranged from her erratic mother, comes back home to protect her half-brother when it becomes clear Mom isn't taking her pills and her "imaginary" friend is showing upr. She first tries the usual, real-world courses of action, talking with CPS, that sort of stuff, but then it becomes clear that "Diana" is more real and more powerful than she expected, responsible for killing both her dad and her brother's dad out of jealousy. Diana insists on dominating her mother, pushing out any time, energy or attention for the family.
How they screwed it up: The only way, the mom concludes, is to kill herself. Wait, wait! While I was in favor of the selfish person self-sacrificing in The Last Exorcism, this is a terrible, even dangerous, way to end a movie about mental illness. Even director Sandberg realized in retrospect that he was telling people with depression that shooting themselves was the only way to protect their families, and he regretted it.
How it should have ended: Like many of the best family dramas, young Rebecca should have been threatened by the possibility that her mother's demons would become her own. Diana shows up at Rebecca's apartment and starts making demands. After all, the mom's middle-aged and if Diana wants to live forever, she's going to want to find a new host. Rebecca's obnoxiously loyal and long-suffering boyfriend, and her half-brother and, in a scene healing a scarred childhood, her mother, all intervene to trap Diana and incinerate her. Rebecca has greater empathy for the struggles of her mother and regrets not being able to have rescued her years ago. Her mother, for her part, regrets not being more open about Diana instead of trying to "protect the children."
Winchester
Theme: Guns are bad.
Plot bearing this out: Old widow Winchester spends her not-inconsiderable fortune building a mansion to appease the dead who have been killed with the family rifle design. Major plot points all center on what happens when a gun ends up in the hands of, respectively, a depressed person, a child, a drug addict, and a really, really angry young man. There are smaller glimpses of the wider impact of gun violence with slavery and colonialism. It's none of it good.
How they screwed it up: Which is why it's weird that the solution is to literally shoot the ghost. With a gun. With a bullet.
How it should have ended: Surely creative types could come up with something better than a literal magic bullet. Me, I'm in favor of some ghost-on-ghost violence. Sarah Winchester releases some of those other angry spirits, ideally some of the ones who would have beef with a Confederate ghost and they end up endlessly tormenting him in some nice locked up room that includes architectural elements from both/all of their lives. Or maybe being confronted with a grief just as powerful and real as his own, evil ghost Ben decides that he doesn't have the monopoly on anger and just passes on.
And there you have it. Don't take us most of the way down an interesting premise and then ruin in the last ten minutes. Yes, there are other things you can do to stink up a movie (both poorly reviewed Winchester and the superb A Quiet Place have too many unnecessary jump-scares), but since we're going to be replaying the end of a scary movie in our heads for days, make sure that it's something worth sticking in there.
There are many things that can cause disappointment in a horror movie. Cheesy acting. Gross-out cheap thrills. Bad special effects. But the one that always slays me (no pun intended) is when a movie is saying really interesting things and then falls completely apart in the last ten minutes, not because the monster looks disappointing to what you imagined (they often do), but because of a lack of thematic consistency. A good horror movie is always about the monsters that we experience in real life as much as those that lurk on screen; great horror movie finishes the job it started with some internal consistency.
Here are three horror movies that really stuck the landing, in no particular order, chosen at more-or-less random from my Saturday morning nap. I could have found others, but these sprung to mind as having particularly satisfying endings:
Night of the Living Dead
Theme: The individual, no matter how competent, is no match for the brainless masses.
Plot bearing this out: When a microcasm of personalities is trapped in a farmhouse, faced with the leagues of the undead, a power struggle for who gets to decide what to do breaks out. But despite a war of personalities inside, the thread outside is without personality. They are pajama-clad, naked, decomposing corpses with zero plan or coordination. And they're winning.
Nailed it: Although our hero, through his wits and courage, manages to survive the night, when the day dawns he is mistaken for a ghoul and shot in the head. And what gets him? A posse of slack-jawed yokels, roving through the countryside, shooting anything that moves, perfectly mirroring the mindlessness of the undead horde, and just as efficient.
A Quiet Place
Theme: It is really hard to protect and nurture family in the face of danger.
Plot bearing this out: Well, the characters right out say it, but even then, from the beginning, it is clear that children, from unborn infants to surly teenagers, are a liability in the face of a lurking destruction that confronts them all. But for all that, children are also a reason, the reason, to keep surviving. An elderly man whose wife is killed commits suicide in a scream. The Abbotts, on the other hand, teach their children not only how to survive in this new world, but how to care for each other in the process.
Nailed it: There is no more "protect and nurture" image than that of brother cradling baby while mom and sister double-team tormenting and shotgunning monsters to obliteration. The family has finally become able to be on the attack, not just sneaking around surviving, but becoming active heroes to actually save the world, which leads to...
10 Cloverfield Lane
Theme: You are stronger than you know, and you can fight harder than you think.
Plot bearing this out: Michelle survives, in order, a car accident, a madman, and freaky-deacky aliens. But all along the way, she doubts whether it wouldn't be easier just to stop fighting and die--or just settle into a banal comfort. After all, board games and tinned food isn't all that bad, especially when you're the favorite, right?
Nailed it: After doing whatever it takes to escape and just survive, Michelle, screeching down an empty road to get the heck out of dodge, hears on the radio that there are more monsters--and survivors-- down another road. She continues on her safe path a moment, then puts it in reverse, and goes speeding into danger to use her new fighting ability and confidence to help others.
***
And now for some horror movies that were doing so well, until they sucked it up in the last ten minutes or so. Again, just for emphasis, I don't mean "the monster was a little disappointing after all the hype" (1408, The Ritual, etc.) or even "it was internally consistent, but I wasn't wowed by their particular level of insight by the end" (Mama, Cabin in the Woods). This is full-blown "Wow, this movie is saying some really important things...oh, wait, no they just ruined everything."
The Last Exorcism
Theme: That classic of Greek theater: the hubris of man in the face of supernatural forces he doesn't understand.
Plot bearing this out: Rev. Cotton Mathis thinks his parishioners are patsies and has an even lower opinion of the folk to hire him to before exorcisms. In this mock documentary, Mathis gleefully lets the crew into his use of stereos, special effects and other modes of hoodwinking hillbillies as one last "screw you" before leaving the church. But this time Nell seems actually, factually possessed.
How they screwed it up: Literal Satan-worshipping hicks. Literal everybody dies. Literal "shaking found footage that you are supposed to believe was somehow saved so you can watch this film now" (THEN WHO WAS DOING ALL THE EDITING UP UNTIL THIS POINT?!)
How it should have ended: 2/3rds of the way, Mathis starts hearing voices telling him that if he literally sacrifices himself, the girl will be released. He doesn't know whether the voices are angels or demons, but he knows it doesn't come from the stereo. He kills himself in a ritual that does not look anything Southern Baptist, and dies horrified to think that he might be dragged down to hell, now that he is more convinced of the reality of the concept. The crew, mortified, tries to stop him, but it's too late. They have to struggle with their journalistic integrity and the horror of what they have witnessed. They're going to complete the documentary and dedicate it to his memory.
Lights Out
Theme: Mental illness affects whole families.
Plot bearing this out: A young woman, estranged from her erratic mother, comes back home to protect her half-brother when it becomes clear Mom isn't taking her pills and her "imaginary" friend is showing upr. She first tries the usual, real-world courses of action, talking with CPS, that sort of stuff, but then it becomes clear that "Diana" is more real and more powerful than she expected, responsible for killing both her dad and her brother's dad out of jealousy. Diana insists on dominating her mother, pushing out any time, energy or attention for the family.
How they screwed it up: The only way, the mom concludes, is to kill herself. Wait, wait! While I was in favor of the selfish person self-sacrificing in The Last Exorcism, this is a terrible, even dangerous, way to end a movie about mental illness. Even director Sandberg realized in retrospect that he was telling people with depression that shooting themselves was the only way to protect their families, and he regretted it.
How it should have ended: Like many of the best family dramas, young Rebecca should have been threatened by the possibility that her mother's demons would become her own. Diana shows up at Rebecca's apartment and starts making demands. After all, the mom's middle-aged and if Diana wants to live forever, she's going to want to find a new host. Rebecca's obnoxiously loyal and long-suffering boyfriend, and her half-brother and, in a scene healing a scarred childhood, her mother, all intervene to trap Diana and incinerate her. Rebecca has greater empathy for the struggles of her mother and regrets not being able to have rescued her years ago. Her mother, for her part, regrets not being more open about Diana instead of trying to "protect the children."
Winchester
Theme: Guns are bad.
Plot bearing this out: Old widow Winchester spends her not-inconsiderable fortune building a mansion to appease the dead who have been killed with the family rifle design. Major plot points all center on what happens when a gun ends up in the hands of, respectively, a depressed person, a child, a drug addict, and a really, really angry young man. There are smaller glimpses of the wider impact of gun violence with slavery and colonialism. It's none of it good.
How they screwed it up: Which is why it's weird that the solution is to literally shoot the ghost. With a gun. With a bullet.
How it should have ended: Surely creative types could come up with something better than a literal magic bullet. Me, I'm in favor of some ghost-on-ghost violence. Sarah Winchester releases some of those other angry spirits, ideally some of the ones who would have beef with a Confederate ghost and they end up endlessly tormenting him in some nice locked up room that includes architectural elements from both/all of their lives. Or maybe being confronted with a grief just as powerful and real as his own, evil ghost Ben decides that he doesn't have the monopoly on anger and just passes on.
And there you have it. Don't take us most of the way down an interesting premise and then ruin in the last ten minutes. Yes, there are other things you can do to stink up a movie (both poorly reviewed Winchester and the superb A Quiet Place have too many unnecessary jump-scares), but since we're going to be replaying the end of a scary movie in our heads for days, make sure that it's something worth sticking in there.
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