Movies that DON'T have happy endings...
 

May contain spoilers.

Memento - Guy Pearce decides that the only real purpose in his life is to keep hunting.

The Mist - Thomas Jane kills his kid and friends for what turns out to be no reason.

The Thing - Kurt Russell freezes to death in a showdown after destroying the compound.

Taxi Driver - Robert Deniro's character isn't capable of being happy after extracting "justice."

...

TFP?

Independence day, they save the world with a mac. a virus from a mac....

right um... oh right you meant plot based? not how I felt after the movie was over? Cuz I mean I wanted to punch every person in the theater after I saw that.


mmm, maybe braveheart & troy

but I consider both of those to be neutral "martyr" style movies.

Requiem for a Dream, but that was so over the top with the simultaneous "hey these people are in the shitter" montage that I was just kinda like a cross between wanting to throw up or laugh uncontrollably

Not sure if it qualifies..

Fight Club. Not sure that was a "happy" ending. It was certainly an awesome ending I thought just because it fully delivered on the proper "fuck it all" attitude that the represented for the previous 2 hours.

Requiem for a Dream

Drag me to Hell. I was hoping for more from this film, considering how much fun the Evil Dead trilogy was, but Sam Raimi did not make this good.

Easy Rider

Some of my favorites, actually:

Se7en

No Country for Old Men

Pan's Labyrinth

Excellent choices everyone.

...

"What's in the box?!"

Movie vs Book ***SPOILER***

Spoiler: The movie had totally different ending than the book. In the book, Marla brings all the support group people up to the top floor of the building as the bomb should have gone off in all the buildings. Seems Tyler built the bombs wrong and none of them work. The Narrator gets throw in the loony bin and sets himself up as a kind of "martyr". He thinks he is dead and in heaven. He thinks his doctor is God and the orderlies are angels. As he walks past the orderlies with punched out eyes, they thank him for his sacrifice. They tell him everything is going according to the plan and they look forward to getting him back.

*****

The ones listed (Fight club, Requiem) and the martyr films (Braveheart, 300).

Empire Strikes Back. Han's in Carbonite, Luke is handless, Rebels are on the run, and Luke found out his daddy was a whiny bitch, I mean Darth Vader.

Poor Thelma & Louise.

Their inevitable demise was the only route they could take.

They were victims of stereotypical writing.

Self-Painted into a corner, the filmmakers offed themselves, vicariously.

Kids

Thinner

Dr. Stangelove

Thinner is a fucked up ending.

Strangelove KABOOM!

Kids.. "Oh shit, what just happened?"

Oh, I love Bachman's Thinner. "Have some pie."

From a human perspective,
I s'pose 'On the beach' might qualify.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Beach_(novel)

Striptease: Demi Moore is very likely leaving the world of stripping for some clerical job. Boo!

Patch Adams: parents allow their sick kids around Robin Williams.

JAWS: the poor shark dies.

The Departed




That's all I got.

The Champ

I changed my mind.

Sex and the city,

I haven't watched it but I heard none of them died.

Night of the living dead
the new dawn of the dead, uncut version
The original ending to Clerks.

+1 for kids.

jaw dropping ending

Irreversible... the entire movie is one bad ending.

On the Beach
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
Robocop
Schindler's List
Saving Private Ryan

New one out: Up In The Air.

American History X. Sheesh.

Heh, was just discussing this. Don't really have anything to add though as what we came up with was already said.

Oh wait, The Dark Knight, cause ya know Heith Ledger dies at the end :eek:

Public Enemies

Zodiac (freaking hated that movie anyway)

Red Cliff

Audition

Gozu

Ichi the Killer

Hannibal

i hate happy endings.

Time Bandits

I'm still shocked by what happens to the kid's parents. I wonder what Gilliam was thinking.

3:10 to Yuma, although not unexpected

The Mist, already listed, but it is the most depressing ending I've ever seen

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest

Saving Private Ryan

The Professional

Dead Poets Society, this one actually brings tears

Fallen

Matrix Revolution, just a really crappy feeling at the end

Fearless

Cowboy Bebop series, one of the greatest unhappy endings ever

The Road.

one of my favorite in this line: Arlington Road. unless you like the bad guys.

Rosemary's Baby
The Descent
Synecdoche, New York
The Orphanage
Quarantine
The Ruins

Of the ones that haven't been mentioned yet:

Oldboy

The Butterfly Effect (the original, not the theatrical ending which sucked huge balls).

Jacob's Ladder

The Midnight Meat Train

Silent Hill

Secret Window

Perfume: The Story of a Murderer

Pay It Forward

K-PAX - not exactly sad, but doesn't give the feeling of closure, which is pretty different from a normal happy end.

Does Seven Pounds count? It's not exactly a surprise.

Anyone put enough thought into Hard Candy enough to think about the implications of the ending? I definitely wouldn't class it as 'happy'

Manon of the Spring

Asylum

The Karate Kid - Johnny Lawrence of the Cobra Kai Dojo in Karate Kid got beaten by that kid for New Jersey, from New Jersey you know where Snooki and The Situation are from.

Are we talking good feeling happy endings? Or happy endings where not everybody dies?

Thelma & Louise
The Little Match Girl
Terminator
Alien
Alien 3
Brian's Song

Dirty Mary & Crazy Larry looked pretty happy right before....

this kinda sucks. I need synopses. (sic)

titles don't readily convey why it's an "unhappy" ending, at least to me.



Prison Song is a real depressing end to what could have been a really uplifting story of a young photographer/artist who was able to escape the hardships of his youth, but a tragic fight lands him in prison, and one more fatal mistake leads to his death.

---------- Post added at 10:38 PM ---------- Previous post was at 10:28 PM ----------

actually, it was three things depicted in the film that made him jump from one stage of his life to the next; not sure if it's ironic or not, but being a black youth, and reaching his "third strike" near the closing, it was really just jarring at how the protagonist met his demise after glimmers of light throughout his lifelong struggle.

Jetée: considering this is a thread about endings, if we all included a description the thread would be one giant spoiler tag.

Spoiler: Se7en: the antagonist confronts the protagonist with the severed head of his pregnant wife. the protagonist snaps, and kills the antagonist in cold blood, and is arrested for murder.

No Country for Old Men: the protagonist dies (off screen, nonetheless), and the serial killer antagonist gets away with a broken arm

Pan's Labyrinth: The 10-year-old-girl protagonist's mother dies in childbirth bearing her stepfather a son. She tries to run away with the baby, the father follows her, takes the baby from her, and shoots her dead

Spoiler: in an awesome montage, all four main character's lives go to shit due to drugs. One becomes a prostitute, one ends up in jail, one has an arm amputated in a prison infirmary from infected track marks, one loses her mind, gets commited to a mental hospital, and subjected to electroshock.

Spoiler: A neonazi goes to jail for killing a black man, goes on a road to recovery, gets out, tries to help his younger brother get out of that life. Just when he starts to get through to him, the brother gets killed.
Spoiler: 3:10 to Yuma, although not unexpected--the plucky underdog father who fights against the odds to survive a hard journey and earn his family desperately needed money succeeds at his dangerous task, and is unexpectedly gunned down in front of his son afterwards

The Mist--apparently an end of the world disaster movie, the protagonist is traveling with 3 people plus his son. he finds his dead wife, they see no signs of other people surviving the disaster, so they decide to end it. They have one gun, so he kills his son and the other three, but is out of bullets when he tries to kill himself. Immediately afterwards, soldiers appear to fight the disaster, meaning he just killed his young son for no reason.

Spoiler: Seven pounds: the protagonist sets up the whole movie lining up organ doners from himself to commit suicide as an act of penance.

Hard candy: another movie that ends in suicide, although the line between antagonist and protagonist is blurred

I'm sort of surprised that Pulp Fiction hasn't come up. Granted, part of it depends on how you class the ending, since the last scene in the film isn't the last part of the story chronologically. However:

Vince Vega gets shot by Butch, who rides off into parts unknown. Butch himself is never able to return to Los Angeles, since that's the deal he made with Wallace. Granted, at least he survived. Jules' fate is undetermined, although he claims he's quitting his work. The only people who can really be said to have made out okay are Honey Bunny and Pumpkin, since they got the money from the diner and presumably managed to get away. Maybe not a sad ending, exactly, but certainly not a happy one either.

A.I.'s ending was a pretty big downer too. After all of his trials, the little robot boy that could only gets one day with 'mom,' and then dies. Huh.

The ending to the film version of Fight Club bugs the hell out of me -- it completely changed the meaning of the story.

I'm not going to bother with spoiler tags. It's inherent in the premise of the thread, I reckon.

Not necessarily. I mean, I like movies with unhappy endings, and so I'd like to be able to open this thread, see the names of movies I haven't seen, and not have them spoiled for me if I don't want.

Sin City - tear jerkingly sad ending
120 Days of Sodom - disgusted cuz of the injustice it ends on
Funny Games - just kinda feel raped and cheated

an amateur porn I made last week - it's just.... just awful

Not everybody considers spoilers a bad thing. They might put into perspective of why one should watch this particular film in order to see how the plot's story unravels to eventually culminate in 'said ending'; and besides, the OP states that spoilers may follow below.

That ending with the aliens was well... pretty shitty. Not sad, just dumb.

It's my opinion that you've more or less described the entire film. If we're making a sad ending list, however, I reckon it deserves to be on it.

War of the Roses...love this movie...it was on tonite

The Last of the Mohicans - Now, I'm not sure if many people will consider this having a "bad" or a "good" ending either way—it's a pretty nebulous closing. But, with what occurred in the span of 20-30 minutes prior, up until Chingachgook's speech of the title's namesake, (in that he is the last of his people) it's just heartbreaking. Everyone dies (save for "the lovers"). Valiantly, yes they meet their end, but it progressively gets worse from when Col. Edmund Munro is assassinated at the beginning of the ambush, to when Alice has to make her decision in between a "rock and no space"; and just one by one, the family and its protectors gradually is torn apart by the war.

a few more

Pay it forward
Gone with the Wind
Diary of Anne Frank
Seven
A walk to remember

What's that movie with Ashley Judd as the mom of a son who befriends a dwarf boy, who then proceeds to accidentally kill her with a pop fly, after developing a crush on her?

I was gonna mention pay it forward - guess I'll have to third it!

I kind of liked the ending to The Usual Suspects, but I suppose it wouldn't be considered "happy"

Artificial Intelligence was the most depressing movie ending I've ever seen. All the little robot wanted was some love from his mother and could never get it. And when he did, she died after a day!!

We're watching Casablanca right now. I think it qualifies for this thread, beautiful friendship aside.

Star Wars - Episodes 5, 2, 3, (?)
Star Trek 2, 10, (?)

...and i don't consider the ending to Spaceballs to be a happy one because Lonestar had to marry Princess Vespa =X

Here are a few more that haven't been mentioned yet...

Closer
The Green Mile
Life Is Beautiful

DUH!:thumbsup:

If you take the ending as the literal ending of the film then Irreversible's ending must count as one of the happiest. Everything is serene and perfect. I think if that film was ordered in the way things happen chronologically I would have felt a whole lot worse afterwards.

I didn't know the story of Into the Wild when I saw it, and was totally gutted by that.

Agreed with Closer - I can't remember feeling more galled at the end of a film.

Some others off the top of my head are Bonnie and Clyde, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and Heavenly Creatures.

I wouldn't exactly call it an unhappy ending. Sure Ilsa and Rick don't end up together and but it's hardly unhappy. Besides now they'll always have Paris.

Oh I don't know if it's been mentioned but
Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon

I can't believe nobody's mentioned "The Godfather!" Man, that last shot of the door closing, and her heart breaking, as she realizes the truth....

Bladerunner
"its too bad she won't live...........but then again, WHO does?"


Last of The Mohicans? No, the family was already torn by career and moves, there was no family. She met a guy to whisk her away, it was perfect. The sister had to die, she had no lines in the film anyways.
When I get a blu-ray, its one of the first discs I will buy, the cinematography is awesome.

The Last American Virgin.

Most of you have probably never heard of it. It was out in the mid 80's I think. Teenage Love Movie (been done a million times). Great soundtrack too.

In brief.....

A movie where Nice boy meets girl, girl is dating Nice boy's best friend (Bad Boy).

Bad Boy gets her pregnant, then dumps her - Bad Boy moves onto other girls.

Nice Boy is in love with girl.

Nice Boy helps girl to the end of the world - does everything for girl, including paying for an abortion for her and caring for her afterwards.

Girl leads Nice Boy to believe she is falling for him. Nice Boy starts to gain confidence.

Nice Boy buys girl braclet, goes to party to give it to her, finds girl in kitchen with Bad Boy necking up a storm.

Fade to black.

VERY realistic, and not what I expected when I went to see this movie. Everyone in audience was stunned.

You can actually see the point where his heart snaps at Minute 1:00

Sophie's Choice.

The Road

Does anyone want to remind me why "The Fountain" had an (un)happy endng or not?
I'm kinda hazy on what the overall result of the film was.