Traveling the world with a stranger, dead rats, and the jazz routine from hell — we're
pretty sure these endings didn't seem so disturbing in the theater.
John Woo's 1997 action flick Face/Off circles around two characters who face off with their,
well, faces off.
FBI agent Sean Archer holds a personal vendetta against Castor Troy, a psychopathic bomber
who murdered Archer's 6-year-old son.
Archer's vendetta drives him to take extreme measures to capture Troy and foil his plans,
eventually leading him to undergo a temporary surgery that makes him look and sound like Troy.
However, a string of unfortunate events confines Archer in the prison he was infiltrating as
Troy, allowing the real Troy to adopt Archer's face and identity.
As a result, Archer's wife, Eve, goes through a series of traumas at the film's climax.
She first finds out that she's been living with a sociopathic killer who she'd mistaken
for her husband, and then she is held hostage by Troy — who still has Sean's face, by the way.
After that, their daughter, Jamie, is also taken hostage by Troy.
In the end, Sean wins back his face and reunites with his family.
In reality, however, it wouldn't be easy for Eve and Jamie to immediately "unsee" Sean
as the murderer and sociopath that Troy was.
Basically, that family is going to need a whole lot of therapy.
Whiplash tells the tale of an extremely toxic teacher-student pair who go to extreme lengths
to perfect their craft and musical talents — at the expense of their relationships,
family, and their own mental health.
Throughout the film, ambitious drummer Andrew Neiman relentlessly hammers towards his desire
for greatness, fueled by his abrasive music teacher Terence Fletcher.
"Why do you suppose I just hurled a chair at your head, Neiman?"
"I don't know."
"Sure you do."
"... the tempo?"
As a result, Andrew distances himself from his father, splits up with his girlfriend,
repeatedly injures his hands from overplaying, and is involved in a near-fatal car accident
before making his way to a concert.
The climactic concert sequence, in which Andrew finally earns Fletcher's nod of approval following
a rigorous drum solo, gives the impression of a triumphant ending for Andrew.
But with time, viewers might come to see that Andrew has ultimately fallen into a deep pit
of suffering and self-abuse.
Andrew's very likely dark path after the film's events is hinted at by Fletcher's constant
idolization of jazz musician Charlie Parker, who himself suffered from mental health issues
and drug addictions, and who died at age 34.
In Robert Zemeckis' classic film Forrest Gump, the titular character's many adventures take
him all around the world.
Despite his low IQ, Forrest achieves fame on the football field, fights in Vietnam,
plays ping-pong against the Chinese, receives the Medal of Honor from President Lyndon B.
Johnson, and reports an office burglary that unfolds into the Watergate scandal.
Plus, he finds himself crossing paths with the likes of Elvis Presley and John Lennon.
However, it's Forrest's relationship with his childhood sweetheart, Jenny, that serves
as the film's unifying narrative thread.
When Forrest finally catches up to Jenny at the end of the movie, she reveals that she's
been infected with an "unknown virus" and that she has a son who is also named "Forrest."
Jenny succumbs to her illness, which is implied to be HIV/AIDS, leaving Forrest Jr. in the
care of Forrest Sr. Tragically, since HIV/AIDS can be transmitted from mother to child during
pregnancy, it's possible that Forrest Jr. also carries the virus.
In a 2019 interview with Yahoo! Entertainment, Forrest Gump screenwriter Eric Roth confirmed
that the now-shelved sequel would have begun with Forrest Jr. being diagnosed with AIDS,
facing bullying and discrimination in school as a result.
In 50 First Dates, Drew Barrymore's Lucy struggles with a form of anterograde amnesia after an
accident, preventing her from being able to create any memories.
Each day is a "reset" for Lucy, who always believes that it's October 13th, the date
of her injury.
Lucy's brother and father go to considerable efforts to recreate the same event for her
every day with the help of the owners of a local cafe — which is where she meets Adam Sandler's Henry.
Henry falls in love with Lucy and devises a way to help her to move on to the next day,
by making her watch a "recap" film of her life up until the moment she wakes up.
Although the ending seems perfectly wholesome and heartening, the implications are more
distressing when you really think about them.
Lucy — who is revealed to have a child with Henry at the end of the film — would have
had to wake up every single day for nine months not knowing she was pregnant, let alone waking
up on a boat beside a stranger.
Not to mention the fact that Henry is going to have to spend most of his life painstakingly
editing and updating her "recap" videos.
It's not exactly ideal.
The plot of Toy Story culminates with Woody and Buzz joining forces with Sid's mistreated
and disfigured toys in order to teach the human bully a lesson.
As Sid is about to send Buzz flying into the air using a firework, Woody speaks to Sid
directly through his pre-programmed voice box — seriously deviating from his usual lines.
"Who are you calling busted, buster?
That's right, I'm talking to you… Sid Phillips."
This acts as a cue for Sid's toys to crawl up to him slowly in creepy, Night of the Living
Dead fashion, heightening Sid's horror.
The scene reaches its apex when Woody bursts out from his "toy" form and tells Sid:
"So play nice."
Sid screams and runs away as the toys rejoice in their newfound freedom.
Great, right?
Well, while Sid getting his long-overdue comeuppance seems fitting for a kids' movie, adults will
notice that Sid now has to live with the guilt of having tortured living things.
Since toys are constantly present in our culture, existing in nearly every home and retail establishment,
seeing a seemingly innocent little toy will most likely trigger painful reminders for
him — reminders that these things are actually sentient.
What makes it worse is that Sid can't talk to anyone about it, since no one would ever
believe him.
It's a pretty cruel fate, especially considering he never thought he was hurting anyone in
the first place.
Big follows 12-year-old Josh Baskin, a boy whose wish to grow "big" comes true when he
grows into an adult body overnight.
Since his mother doesn't believe that this 30-year-old man is indeed her son, Josh moves
to New York City and gets an entry level job at a prominent toy manufacturing company.
That's where he impresses owner Mr. MacMillan with his insight into current toys and his
childlike enthusiasm.
Soon, Josh is promoted to vice president of product development.
Along the way, Josh develops a romantic relationship with co-worker Susan Lawrence, which fades
away as our protagonist finds adulthood more and more exhausting.
Eventually, he wishes to become a child again.
Despite Susan's initial disbelief, she is ultimately convinced that Josh is a child,
and she bids a tearful goodbye at the end of the film as she drops him at his home.
Worryingly, the revelation that Josh was a 12-year-old child all along doesn't cause
Susan any distress at any time during the movie's ending — which is especially odd
considering that she had previously spent the night at Josh's apartment.
The fact that she still harbors love for Josh at the end of the film, as well as her total
lack of regret over having been intimate with him, indicate something seriously wrong with Susan.
Ratatouille is the tale of Remy the rat, the only rodent among his clan with a taste for
good food.
A series of events causes Remy to become separated from his family, and the ambitious rat finds
himself in Paris, home to Gusteau's, the restaurant of Remy's cooking idol Auguste Gusteau.
Here, he befriends the clumsy but sweet Alfredo Linguini, who Remy uses as a human conduit
to channel his culinary talents.
Eventually, Gusteau's regains its lost reputation and opens the door to Remy's own bistro, La Ratatouille.
Granted, a rat becoming a chef is an amusing premise for a Pixar movie, but perhaps not
so much for real life.
Given that the average lifespan of a rat is 2 years — and Remy seems to be well into
his adulthood — it's very likely that Remy will pass away less than a year after the
film's ending.
Since his newly opened bistro La Ratatouille hinges on his culinary prowess, it's not exactly
ideal for the bistro's management and investors that its head chef won't live past a year.
Then again, we're talking about a rat that can cook, understand English, and control
a human being like a puppet by pulling on his hair.
Maybe we can give Pixar the benefit of the doubt and assume rats live longer in the Ratatouille universe.
At the end of Back to the Future, Marty McFly returns from 1955 to an altered 1985 where
his family's personalities have done a complete 180.
His father seems to be much more confident and has built a successful writing career,
his mother seems healthy and happy in her marriage, his brother has a well-paying job,
and his sister has quite the active dating life.
"Great Scott!"
On the surface, this seems like the best possible future for anyone to return to.
However, because Marty still remembers events from the earlier timeline, his "new" family
members are total strangers to him.
This means that he'll have to deal with the knowledge of his parents' prior personalities
without being able to discuss it with anybody.
It's also unsettling to consider that, if Marty perhaps created a new timeline, his
parents in the original timeline may still be waiting for him to return — if they haven't
been written out of time entirely.
Additionally, the family now employs Biff as a valet, seemingly forgetting that 30 years
ago, on the night of the prom dance, Biff tried to force himself onto Lorraine, forcing
George to come to the rescue.
That can't be the most comfortable situation for poor Lorraine.