Vote up the movies that end on a high note without an explosive climax.
The word "anticlimactic” usually has a negative connotation. When applied to movies, it means the story had a lot of build-up for minimal pay-off. Few things are as frustrating as devoting a couple hours to a film, then having it completely fizzle out when it should be pulling out all the stops.
But every rule has its exceptions, and this one is no different. Certain films exist that are anticlimatic in an awesome way rather than a maddening one. Instead of giving us what we expect, they take a hard left turn, offering us a new perspective on the story or leaving us with some sort of bigger idea to ponder afterward. They surprise us in the best possible manner. The following movies all did that. Had they ended in predictable fashion, they would, ironically, be far less memorable than they actually are.
Monty Python and the Holy Grail finds the British comedy troupe doing a wild, hilarious riff on the King Arthur tale. Graham Chapman plays the legendary figure. As the title implies, he leads his knights on a quest to find the Holy Grail. Their trek is filled with various perils, including a three-headed knight and a killer rabbit. Each new threat brings with it a new level of humor.
The movie ends with Arthur and colleague Bedevere (Terry Jones) reaching the Castle Aarrgh, which is occupied by some extremely rude French soldiers they encountered earlier in the story. The men assemble an army to storm the castle and take it over. All of it is played in very serious fashion. Before they can do that, modern-day police arrive and arrest them. In a brilliant moment of breaking the fourth wall, one of the cops puts his hand over the camera lens, effectively ending the film. This finale is purely in line with Monty Python's brand of comedy. Why end a movie normally when you can end it with a completely unexpected, off-the-wall punchline?
Joel and Ethan Coen's No Country for Old Men details the efforts of psychopath Anton Chigurh (Javier Bardem) to retrieve the satchel full of money that Texas welder Llewelyn Moss (Josh Brolin) stumbled upon and absconded with in the aftermath of a drug deal gone wrong. He carries around a bolt gun to use on anyone who stands in his way. Meanwhile, Sheriff Ed Tom Bell (Tommy Lee Jones) is on the hunt for Chigurh, who leaves a trail of dead bodies in his wake.
Audiences are conditioned to expect a climactic showdown between the hero and the villain. No Country for Old Men denies them that. Llewelyn dies off-screen. The film ends with Chigurh wounded after getting hit by a car, yet still running off with his cash. Bell, meanwhile, gives up the pursuit, having become deeply afraid of the killer's violent ways. The final scene finds him telling his wife about two dreams he had. It's a glorious existential monologue, one revealing he is quite aware that he's an old man, and the unhinged violence of modern-day criminals is no country for someone like him anymore.
Uma Thurman plays “the Bride” in Quentin Tarantino's Kill Bill saga. On her wedding day, she was brutally attacked by her former compatriots, a group known as the Deadly Viper Assassination Squad. They killed her husband, then left her for dead. Miraculously, she survived. Full of rage after years in a coma, she vows to take down every member of the DVAS, then find their leader, Bill (David Carradine), and take him down. Vol. 1 finds the Bride confronting and killing Vernita Green (Vivica A. Fox) and O-Ren Ishii (Lucy Liu).
Kill Bill Vol. 2 puts her much closer to her prime target. After brutally killing his minions, the Bride finally comes face-to-face with Bill. Instead of taking him out with a sword, as she did to several other people caught in her vengeful warpath, she lulls him into conversation, then abruptly hits him with the “Five-Point Exploding Heart Technique” - a simple, yet instantly lethal fighting maneuver that was previously introduced in the story. Instead of an action-packed showdown, the movie ends with a swift death for Bill. It works because the technique has already been established as horrific, so we know Bill is actually dying in the worst possible manner.
The Final Countdown, released in 1980, has one of those irresistible high concepts. Kirk Douglas plays Matthew Yelland, the Commanding Officer of the USS Nimitz. While on a training mission in the Pacific Ocean, the ship encounters a weird storm and gets sucked into a vortex. Upon re-emerging, Yelland and crew find themselves transported back in time to Dec. 6, 1941 - the day before the infamous attack on Pearl Harbor.
Anyone watching the movie for the first time would understandably expect a rousing action flick in which the crew of the Nimitz works to prevent the historical catastrophe. But that's not what happens. The Final Countdown sets things up to suggest an intervention, then has the vortex return and suck the ship back to 1980 before they can alter time. However, a tantalizing little twist is in there. Two of the men, including Commander Dick Owens (James Farentino), are left behind. At the very end, it's revealed that Owens is secretly the mysterious defense contractor whose firm constructed the Nimitz. This gets viewers wondering what time-altering events did happen that were carried out covertly. In other words, the story suggests Owens may have changed history in ways no one knows about.
Harrison Ford makes his fifth and final appearance as the famed adventurer in Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny. The plot revolves around his efforts to locate the pieces of Archimedes’ Dial, a gizmo invented by the mathematician it's named for. Also trying to find it is Jürgen Voller (Mads Mikkelsen), a former Nazi who believes he can use the dial's powers to rewrite WWII so that Germany wins. Helping Indy - usually, at least - is his goddaughter Helena Shaw (Phoebe Waller-Bridge).
The previous Indiana Jones movies ended with the suggestion that Indy would have another adventure down the road. Not Dial of Destiny. There is an action-packed climax that sees our hero briefly going back in time. Rather than use the time-traveling opportunity to change the past, the message is clear that they must not intervene more than they already have. Indy, for his part, wants to stay there, and live out his life in the ancient past. That's not in the cards, either.
Once returned to 1969, he has a reunion with estranged wife Marion (Karen Allen). The two reconcile, the affection between them very apparent, despite their difficulties. As the film concludes, it's clear Indy is done going on adventures. His life from here on out will be one of quiet domesticity with the woman he loves. This makes a beautiful ending for a classic hero.
Jodie Foster plays Dr. Ellie Arroway in 1997's Contact. She's a scientist with the SETI program, looking for signs of extraterrestrial life. When a radio transmission seemingly comes from a faraway star, Ellie believes she has finally gotten the proof she's long been hoping for. Under her watch, the program sends messages back, establishing a communication with whoever - or whatever - is out there.
The plot builds up to her being able to make direct contact with alien life. Ellie is placed inside a pod that appears to launch through a wormhole in space. Rather than coming face-to-face with a new, previously unseen entity, she ends up on a beach identical to one she drew as a child. The alien, meanwhile, appears to her in the form of her father. They have a brief conversation, after which the alien leaves. Although Contact doesn't give viewers the kind of meeting that's expected, having the extraterrestrial being take on the form of her dad helps to tie up a thread involving Ellie and her childhood relationship with him. Robert Zemeckis gives us a finale with an emotional punch.
