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Can you enjoy a movie with a dark, bleak, hopeless, or sinister ending? *SPOILERS*

RedRum

Banned
While I used to think I could, I think they're starting to wear on me. Especially in the theater.

I watched Alien Covenant last night in the theater with a few friends and after the ending rolled, I swear it felt like the at the atmosphere was thick with depression. Long faces, no talk, etc.

It just feels odd to see characters in a movie go through shit, feel like they have triumphed, in a way, only to have it stolen from them. I remember watching Kids years ago and the entirety of that movie was just bleak and depressing.

What about you?

Since someone mentioned it: Earth sends out a crew of 2000 colonists + crew to start a colony on a new world. They bring an android that is their caretaker for the long trip. A natural space phenomenon damages the ship and brings the crew out of hypersleep, killing a portion of them as well as the main character's spouse. The captain decides to check out a signal on a nearby planet, lands there, encounters aliens and a crazed android from the first movie that actually created the alien species. He looks exactly like the android the crew brings with them. Of course, the crew gets decimated by the aliens and only like two + the android survive (the twist is that android that was with the crew is not replaced with the crazed android). They fight an alien on the ship and win, thinking it's over and that they will continue to their original planet. However, it's reveal to the main character as she is being put into hypersleep by the android that he is not the one they came with. It ends with you knowing that the android will "probably" eventually slaughter everyone on that ship to advance his alien creation. The movie ends.
 

Kahoona

Member
Not to be a jerk, but just putting *SPOILERS* in the title without actually saying what you're spoiling is not very helpful.
 
D

Deleted member 752119

Unconfirmed Member
Enjoy? No.

Appreciate artistically? Yes.

So I mostly skip them these days too. I'm too mentally exhausted to care much about art these days and just want enjoyable escapism. Not knocking those kind of movies etc., I just don't have the mental energy for them lately or for the foreseeable future.
 

RedRum

Banned
Not to be a jerk, but just putting *SPOILERS* in the title without actually saying what you're spoiling is not very helpful.

I put the spoiler tag in there just in case someone wanted to describe a part in a movie ending or some such that made them uneasy. My bad.
 

Toxi

Banned
Alien Covenant just had a bad ending. There are movies with great depressing endings, but Alien Covenant isn't one of them.
 
Honestly it really intrigues me when it's a prequel. You technically know what's going to happen cause, you know, it's a prequel which means that obviously the original already came out but to actually see why the world or the characters in the original story are messed up brings a whole nother point to the story.

Sorry if that didn't make sense.
 

Ventara

Member
I'll be honest. No. That kind of stuff gives me a bad feeling, and although it can be interesting and impactful at times at how it's approached, rarely will the interest exceed the depressed mood it gives me.
 

Acyl

Member
A movie does a good job if it makes you feel something. Doesn't have to be a good feeling when you walk away from it. Some people might associate that bad feeling with the movie as it was an unenjoyable movie. Depends why you see the film I guess.

Yes, I definitely can enjoy movies with dark endings as long as they are done well.
 

daffy

Banned
Not to be a jerk, but just putting *SPOILERS* in the title without actually saying what you're spoiling is not very helpful.
yeah kind of tactless especially for a new release movie. But I've come to expect that OT gaffers don't know how to spoiler tag shit
 

Haly

One day I realized that sadness is just another word for not enough coffee.
Yeah, I love feeling like shit.
 

Jarmel

Banned
It depends, mainly in how the movie is structured and the overall tone. If the atmosphere is bleak throughout then I'm fine with it however if it's some last minute swerve or if the movie seems to just unnecessarily try and beat down the characters then no.
 

F0rneus

Tears in the rain
I prefer happy endings as a horror fan. There was this big wave of cynical endings from 2005 to 2012 (approximatively) that killed the fun of rewatches for me. Then happy endings kind of became the norm again.
 

HStallion

Now what's the next step in your master plan?
Yeah of course. Sometimes a dark hopeless ending is the only fitting one for a story. The Road is probably one of the darkest grimmest stories I've ever read and it does have hope in it but man its still bleak as it gets.
 

kiri

Member
The Mist? Great Ending.
Sutherland's Invasion of the Body Snatchers? Great Ending.
Jacob's Ladder? Great Ending.

Bummer endings aren't always a bad thing.
 
Yes of course. They tend to stick with me a lot longer. Happy endings are fine too. Depends on the film entirely.

Covenant was predictable as hell though.
 
A lot of crime movies have bleak endings, so yeah I guess.

Sometimes though the dire hopelessness of some movies really puts me off repeat viewings.
 

Savitar

Member
Are you kidding, I love the Mist. And I love it due to the ending, that's what makes it so great in the end, how it ends!
 

RedRum

Banned
I think Jarmel said it well as well. It depends on the overall tone of the movie. I thought the Mist never gave you a sense that all will be well, until the very very very end. Then it beat you down a little further when you find out the woman at the beginning, that no one helped, survived.
 
Of course. Enjoyment heavily relies on context. Like if a movie has established a bleak dark hopeless tone, but then betrays that mood and atmosphere with a tonal shift at the ending that seems at odds with the rest of the movie, I'm not going to enjoy that ending that much

Enjoying a movie doesn't just mean it has to leave you feeling positive or happy. It's much broader than that, and very much reliant on the movie itself. I'd say it's more if the movie leaves you satisfied
 

Gravidee

Member
I didn't like the ending to The Mist, but I did like the ending to Alien Covenant. I guess it really depends on the situation and what lead up to it.
 
I didn't like the ending to The Mist, but I did like the ending to Alien Covenant. I guess it really depends on the situation and what lead up to it.
I felt like Alien Covenant didn't earn that ending. Kind of how Alien 3's handling of Newt and Hicks feels like such a whiplash if you watch it right after Aliens.
 
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