Ending
Anybody want to explain that ending to me?
What is the significance of the clock/ticking?
Biological clock, life ticking away, blah blah blah
"Eye for an eye, and the whole world's a pirate"
MovieChat Forums > Tiny Furniture (2012) Discussion > Ending
My take is that there is no more significance than any other scene. It's just the last scene shown: now we won't see any more of her life, at least not in this movie. I liked it but I think people are overthinking it.
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Time is ticking by. It doesn't matter when Aura moves the clock out of the room; her mother can still hear it, and so can she. The difference is it's louder to Aura's mother because she's older and more aware of time (which is why the sound is more prominent to her). Aura says something along the lines of, "It's better now though, right?" which can have a few meanings, but mostly I took it as her denial and avoidance that time is still passing and she's growing up- as much as she'd like to hold it off.
I brought lemons
Also, the distraction of time/clock/ANY issue really is foreshadowed in earlier scene in film when Jed, in response to alarm's morning disturbance, groggily asks Aura, "Can you handle that?"
shareThe end was about 30 mins. in, when you fell asleep. :)
I'm better than you.
My interpretation of the ending is that Aura does a half-assed job of muffling the ticking sound, and assumes that it's sufficient: it's better, even if it's not gone. Likewise, she's half-assed in every other element of her life and assumes that it's sufficient: she reluctantly gets a job way beneath her education and ability, goes after guys and sexual situations way beneath what should be her level of dignity and self-esteem, and disrespects her family and herself in ways that she knows will be egregious. She is not a fully-formed human being, but I think one of the points of the film is that she's a work in progress.
shareVery sharp observations and insight. I really have to agree with you.
shareYes, BuzzWurthy. It's like something Lena Dunham would have said.
shareI also fully agree with Buzzworthy, there is also the fact that her mother points out the fact that she (in her older and weary, bad-back age) can still hear the clock ticking. Aura then replies, 'But it isn't that bad right?' a fitting metaphor for the fact that life ticks on and on and we cannot fully stop it no matter what- but it isn't all tough, most of the time...it is bearable. Great film, wonderful symbolism.
shareThanks, Buzzworthy & CrazyMoon, for making some sense of it.
shareYep, I have to also agree with this interpretation of her last line. Another example of doing the bare minimum ("good enough, right?") which seems to be her M.O. as she has yet to become a self-motivated, functioning adult after graduating college and still having no direction in her life.
Fighting the frizzies, at 11.
Weird, I didn't take it as a metaphor for time ticking by so much as Aura clarifying that the sounds of life get easier to "listen" to as you age. That, just as her mother eventually got over her 20's, Aura will too.
The clock ticking represents running out of film. The stuff is expensive, so it was time to wrap it up. The budget was only $65,000 ...
share@trisul: Actually, they did not use film; they used the 7D digital camera. However, budgets are affected by the number of production days and craft services too. Your point is still made. :)