the ending sucks

Which is exactly what Angus told her would be the best choice!

Very funny comments, rprokipczuk, I really got a kick out of them.

smile321, I enjoyed reading your entire lengthy post. I agree with you completely, I think you make some very good points.

My daughter had to read the book for school, and we all watched the movie after she was done. A very good movie, I plan on reading the book too, even though my daughter said some things are different in it (as happens quite often!).

I agree with the ending stinking, too, but not just because the love interest doesn't pan out. There's a huge theme here that was totally ignored: What will happen to the Tucks? They're good people who've been given a gift they don't know what to do with. Why are they left to fade away into oblivion? This movie is about more than Winnie deciding to listen to pessimistic Angus Tuck about his "life unlived." His life was unlived because Angus didn't value the gift of immortality he'd been given. He saw it as a curse rather than a blessing, and this is allowed to color Winnie's (and the viewer's) whole perspective of immortality, creating a bleak and incomplete ending. You're supposed to agree with Angus (or rather Ms. Babbitt, the author).

Hogwash. Angus could have saved the world with that gift! You have to value life to value the spring, and treating the spring of everlasting life like a curse seemed like a sacrilege to me. Of course, that's just my personal viewpoint. But I believe if we were meant to die we wouldn't fight it every step of the way like the majority of us do, nor why we put such importance on living a "long and happy life." WE are immortal. Only our bodies die. Why is it so bad to wish them to last as long as we do?

Angus didn't value his immortality, but Jesse did. He wanted to "see the whole world, every speck of it!" and since the world is always changing, there would always be something new to see. More than that, something new to accomplish, new goals, new dreams, which could start with the beautiful blessing he already possessed: appreciation of what he's been given.

Of all of them, Jesse understood what it was to actually live his life. He chose to embrace it every day, revelling in it with all its changes. He encouraged someone else, Winnie, to enjoy it with him.

Winnie needed freedom. She suffered the grief of her grandmother's death and heard her mother's heartfelt words, "I wish you could always stay my little girl." Her family needed freedom from that stifling high-society life they were trapped in. They could have been good people too. They could have protected the spring and the Tucks, using their wealth and position in the community to find a way to bring this blessing to the world without a stampede, or more people being killed over the business opportunity.

Winnie would have been the perfect person to bring the first step of resolution to the Tucks' dilemma of "what do we do with this?" If she'd loved Jesse enough to drink the water and go with him, Miles could have seen how happy they were, and found the courage to find his own, really true, love, the second time.

Angus is a coward to hide his family away from the world just because they are different. Yes, the gift of immortality is a dangerous one. But not everyone is a "man in a yellow suit." A gift like that, carefully guarded and given away, could create a Shambala (or Shangri-La).

Mae only needs her family to come to terms with its gift to be happy. She tries constantly to create peace among them. When Jesse, Miles and Angus are happy, she will need nothing more because she is that kind of person.

Together, the Tucks and the Fosters could have literally created a "heaven on earth," because when you are immortal, and you base your life on love of one another, and love of your neighbor, such a thing could be possible, eh?

I had to write this because the movie left me desperate for a resolution to the Tucks' situation, and Jesse and Winnie seemed like the perfect answer. Sorry, but I don't buy the "we're meant to die" bit. I never have and never will, and Ms. Babbitt can keep her view of it as far as I'm concerned. Each person on this earth is a unique individual, with unique contributions to make to the world, and the loss of any one is an eternal loss.

Some of you don't seem to understand the message of this book at all. I read it in fifth grade, and it's a beautiful book. And through the entire thing, circles are used as an example. Everything moves in circles. Life runs in circles, that's the way it is. And the Tucks aren't in that natural circle anymore. Their existance is meaningless.

The thing about life that motivates people is time. We don't have forever, so we go to school young, get out of college and get a job and become sucessful. We try to do everything before we die, because we know that death is inevitable.

Yes, it's romantic thinking about living with you true love forever. But in my opinion, JESSE was being selfish by asking her to live forever. He knew what it was like, and he knew that he was asking her to give up her entire life, literally, just to be with him.

And their whole relationship semeed a lot more like infatuation to me, by the way.

I understood the message behind the story and I thought she made the right choice! To live forever isn't really living at all..

HOWEVER!! If that were me and my boyfriend I have to admitt I'd drink it in a heartbeat...I guess I wouldn't be "living" But to spend eternity with the person I love is somthing I don't think I could pass up! But then again I wouldn't have to wait for my boyfriend for 85 years to come back to me!