That boy needs help, what with smashing up his grandmother's sitting room and using excessive force on a bully and just generally walking around in a dream state.
And what is the significance of 12:07?
Why are you here if you haven't seen the movie yet?
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Conor put the bully in hospital, that's usually quite serious.
Why are you here if you haven't seen the movie yet?
If you end up in the hospital because you were assaulting and/or harassing somebody, I say that is on you. I'm a bit sick of bullies getting away with all sorts of violence and theft, things anybody else would be sent to prison for. But the moment the victim fights back, we want to make an example of them?
shareI see your point. Plus, the bully was pulling at Conor's tongue as well, which I thought was actually creepy.
Why are you here if you haven't seen the movie yet?
You assume the teacher knew about the bullying.
Also, Connor wasn't defending himself. The bully was WALKING AWAY.
All hail the underdogs
All hail the new kids
All hail the outlaws
Spielbergs and Kubricks
I agree. Although Connor overstepped his bounds but tbh, his pain and anger were all pent up after continuous beatings, mocking, & bullying while his beloved mother was dying (& he was close to her, not the father nor the grandmother). Imo the bully was more at fault than Connor for what happened.
shareThat's rather why I don't plan on seeing it. It became so obvious just from the trailer...
I'm totally done with the 'it was all in your head' trope. Same with 'it was all a dream' and 'we're stuck in a dream' stories. They weren't that interesting the FIRST time I read such stories, as it trivializes everything that takes place in the story and renders it pointless.
Why can't the monsters actually exist in a fantasy movie? Or, at the very least, leave it ambiguous. I cannot fathom why the wonder must be sucked out of stories like this at the end.
I'm totally done with the 'it was all in your head' trope. Same with 'it was all a dream' and 'we're stuck in a dream' stories.
Why would I think that?
It WASN'T all in her head. Good grief, the evidence was EVERYWHERE that significant time had passed! If nothing else, just look at all the leaves and grass fallen on and grown up around their car! How could that have happened in the minutes they believed they'd been in the tunnel?
And there was Chihiro's head band, CLEARLY the one she'd been given by Zaneba!
See, I pay attention to detail.
Thank you. 
Why are you here if you haven't seen the movie yet?
It is left as ambiguous. It never explicitly says if the monster is real or not.
shareGo see it. This film doesn't attempt to trick the viewer into thinking any of this is real. You said it yourself, you see in the trailer that it is not real. It isn't about a big reveal of it being imaginary. You know the entire time it is in his head, it is just how he is dealing with the awful situation he is in. The movie is about coping.
"I can't remember anything without you"
You should watch the film before deciding what it is when you haven't seen it. Things are left ambiguously in the end, and it's up to the viewer to decide about the monster. I personally interpret it to be real and an amalgamation of loved ones.
shareThe ending was extremely blunt I feel. Liam Neeson was his grandfather FFS, you can't get more obvious than that.
And with his mum also being helped through her grief of losing her own father, by her own (tree) father and the fact she looked straight at the tree when she was about to die.
A very unambiguous ending in my opinion.
As for 12:07. Revelations 12 is called *the woman, the child and the dragon* which lines up a little - but verse 07 isn't applicable so my argument falters.
There's a scene where Conner is picking up family pictures and Liam Neeson is in one of them, from there it clicked on who the tree was.
shareThere's a scene where Conner is picking up family pictures and Liam Neeson is in one of them, from there it clicked on who the tree was.
Of course he needs help! He is 12 years old living with his single mother who is slowly dying! I'm 28 years old and would need help if I was dealing with a situation like that. Children are fragile, and they express their need for help in different ways. Conner's way of showing that he needs support is to lash out violently. It's a cry for help/his way of coping with this situation.
Also...that bully had it coming.
"I can't remember anything without you"
There is no hard evidence that the Monster is real.
However ....
1) If this is the kid's subconscious talking to him, it's a pretty extraordinary subconscious. As a former psych grad student, I would say that it's extraordinary to the degree that it seems unlikely to be real.
This isn't to say that the Monster would thus have to be real, but rather that the fantasy element may be the power of the boy's subconscious. This is not a bad reading of the film, when you consider the subconscious roots of story, especially fairy tales.
2) His Mom appears to look at, and recognize the Monster, in the hospital room.
We learn that the Monster appears exactly as his Mom once drew him, and that she drew him with herself perched on his shoulder, as if he were her protector. Earlier, we see scenes of her trying to teach Connor how to draw the Monster, but (by Connor's reaction to her drawings at the end) it is suggested that he never learned his appearance in the detail he later imagines him having.
3) The Mom dies at 12:07. But again, maybe the fantasy element is that the boy had a premonition of that.
My conclusion? The Monster does exist in the boy's imagination and in his mother's, rather than in what we would call the "real" world, but at the same time, he's real in a way unlike ordinary imagined things. Which is to say, the Monster is real in a way that is essentially unique for fantasy.
Carrying this further: the Monster is a real being, with psychological autonomy, capable of knowing things that Connor cannot. He was created in a nascent form by Connor's mother and was brought to full life by Connor. In both cases, he lives within their imaginations; in Connor's, at least, he can only appear in fugue states that are like waking dreams.
I think it's one of the film's greatest achievements.
Prepare your minds for a new scale of physical, scientific values, gentlemen.share
I think it's all Sigourney Weaver imagination and then she wakes up in the ship sent to investigate an SOS distress call.
So it's actually a prequel to Alien and a sequel to Prometheus.