I just watched this film & was left feeling ripped off at the end. The movie was great, but leaves you with no closure come the ending. What happens to Owen? And just a brief mention of Alva's death?
I hate when movies just wrap up everything in 2 minutes at the end.
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It's true the ending is terribly rushed, considering all that has gone on before. Nice to see a downbeat ending though for a change.
I watched this film last night in full widescreen, on French tv station TPS, but not dubbed, terrific performances, and oh-my-god Natalie Wood looked oh-so-sexy.
The men in the film were ok, but for me Natalie Wood, Katie Reid and Mary Badham STOLE this film with excellent performances. 8/10
Absolutely...we felt disappointed also!! It was very upsetting that Willie was left living in that condemned property and why did her mother not even care? We did enjoy the movie though.
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The mother appeared to care very little about either one of her daughters. She was willing to more or less turn Alva into a prostitute in order for her to have a life.
shareThe ending did feel a bit rushed. Otherwise, I really enjoyed this movie. Natalie Wood, Robert Redford, Mary Badham, and Kate Reid were all outstanding.
"Dry your eyes baby, it's out of character."
It was a terrible ending!! Owen should have pushed the mother out the door and lived happily ever after with Alva.
sharetheres no REAL happily ever afters,,good movie! Natalie was beautiful
shareIn a williams movie the heroine is always let down by the hero... and it's always sad :(
Streetcar, the roman spring of mrs. stone, the fugitive kind, and of course the glass menageri.
This was a great, if downbeat ending.
It shows the difference between movies in the sixties verses movie today.
We would never ever be able to see such an ending in popular film today, not with all the committees, as opposed to directors, making films who are always looking for the feel-good, least challenging ending as possible to attract the widest audience. Realism and great filmmaking be damned.
This was just a bad movie. I live in the area that the movie was filmed in and to tell the truth NOTHING MUCH has changed. the people of the city of Bay St Louis, MS should shiver because of that. KAtrina ruined the city. The old farts of the city will not let the city build anything to help improve the city.
shareMy problem is the movie should have ended 20 minutes before it did, when Alva got on the train. I hated the conventional romantic scenes and thought the breakup was forced melodrama.
shareNo one is saying the ending is bad because it isn't a 'happy ending'...the ending was bad because it was completely rushed and it felt like there was a great deal of the story missing. I cant remember ever seeing an ending like it, such a dissapointment considering how amazing wood and redford's performances were!!
You have to answer for Santino, Carlo.
It's not about it having a happy ending, I actually prefer what happened at the end but how it was calculated and put together just ended up being a major disaster.
shareI agree with this. I just saw the movie for the first time last night, and I went, "That's the end?" She ran out into the rain, and you see Willie telling the story again. Umm, I'm assuming Alva got sick from running in the rain and died, but where? Dodson? New Orleans?
It just felt rushed, and there was no real closure to it. You don't know what happens to Owen or what will become of poor Willie.
I don't think it should matter exactly how things went on after the climax when Alva ran off. Their utopic romance came to an abrupt and sad end which makes it more dramatic and tragic. That's why the story as Willie told it ended. I'm sure Coppola and compay thought it out carefully and decided that was how it should end.
I'm here, Mr. Man, I can not tell no lie and I'll be right here 'till the day I die
I agree--the movie ended VERY abruptly. I'm still wondering what happened to Owen! The tragedy of it didn't surprise me. After all this IS based on a Tennessee Williams play and none of his stories have happy endings.
sharePreppy-3, why is there so many questions about "what happened to Owen?" He went on to live his life. He took the transfer and promotion. Of course, he grived for Alva, but you go on.
shareThen why didn't it show that? It just...ENDED! You say all that happened but you're just guessing. The movie shouldn't have stopped with so mnay unanswered questions. And seriously--how do u KNOW he grieved for Alva???? There's no evidence of that.
sharePreppy 3, it did end abruptly, I agree. Just with the little sis giving a quick summation. But I think one has to just kind of figure it out. Owen did love Alva, so you do grieve when a loved one dies, right? Also, what else could he do but just continue along his life's path. Work, the promotion....The thing that bothered me was the kid just roaming around with no home. Where in heck was that mother? She was a disgusting person, certainly, but would she really just let the kid run away? This was in the 30's, during the depression, maybe that wasn't so unusual.
shareI guess you might be right but I would have preferred a more clear cut ending. As for the kid living alone--did that really surprise u? That mother cared about nobody but herself. It didn't surprise me. And, as u said, I think that DID happen during the Great Depression.
sharePreppy-3, you're right, after you invest your time and sometimes your emotions, it's frustrating to have the end feel tacked on. It's a copout and kind of a sellout. Cheats the audience.
shareThank u deliaw. Sometimes open ends work...but not here. Tennessee Williams (the author) HATED this film.
shareYes, you must be 13, since you use the text-speak "u" for "you" when attempting to express yourself.
shareDo you have to be told, or must you see, everything? Have you no insight or imagination, to figure out on your own what would have happened? I sure hope you're 13 years old, and not an adult, because I can't imagine how you can function as an adult in this world, when you appear to have to have everything literally explained to you.
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I also found the ending terribly disappointing.
Not because it was unhappy, after all how can a T.W. play have a happy ending?
It's just that it was so rushed that have I watched it on a TV channel and not on DVD, I'd be certain there were scenes cut out.
I hate these endings...
Disagree. It was a great story and had a feeling of real characters about it. Times were tough back then in a lot of ways. So the film wasn't a fairy tale, so what?
shareI would not say that the ending was horrible, but it might have been rushed a bit. The movie was thought provoking. One theme is how the railroad played a major factor in the life and death of a small town. The other themes that focused on the Natalie Wood character and her relationship with Owen, her mother, and the other men. The conflict between your personal dreams and the reality of your current situation.
I would have preferred an ending with Owen returning back to Dodson to take Willie with him. But I thought the ending was fine nonetheless.
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