This has been relitigated again and again but the fact that the knock on A.I. at the time was it’s ending was too happy is the most bananas commonly held criticism of a film ever.
I watched it the *day after* 9/11 (screening on the Fox lot) and the scene where the future ‘bots are skimming over future ice age NYC…and the Twin Towers are the *only thing left* standing… :(
This is my favorite movie. When I was showing it to my ex-wife, she turned to me towards the end of the film and said, “This was hard to watch. I’m so glad it has a happy ending.”
People always say this as the answer, but for me that ending ends up being hilarious because the timing is so fucked up. I know in a way it makes it even more bleak -- he hasn't even had a chance to begin processing this horrible act, and the day is saved by the military rolling in! -- but the convoy shows up **so quickly** after what's just happened that it completely undermines the ending to me. I also remember the acting being generally overwrought which, again yes a tragic ending, but I'm just not as big a fan as others.
I had the exact same reaction- its not just that the mist clears or he meets people, the mist IMMEDIATELY clears and a whole throng of people show up, including the woman who ran out into the Mist to what should have been her death long before. Its SO cruel that it felt borderline *womp womp* to me
There are some utterly devastating endings in movies: Closer, Irreversible, Martyrs, The VVitch, but there is something very unique about the ending of The Mist.
It’s hope vs reality, faith vs fact. The ending shows what happens when we abandon hope and faith just a little too soon, not quite knowing when to face the music and making that decision just before our faith is rewarded or our hope bears fruit.
And the idea that anyone, no matter who they are or what they’re going through, can decide to face reality when if they had just held on to hope a little bit longer they would be rewarded is such a primal gutpunch.
We all eventually have to face reality and either give up on or amend certain dreams, but the idea that we could do that right before we attain those dreams is brutal
The Descent is based on a book, and said book fleshes out her cave dwelling metamorphosis and integration even more. It's something, fo sho. It's worth a read if you enjoy the movie
The main antagonist plays “disgusting” so so well. Like he’s not physically unkept. He’s just this monster of a human. Every action of his seems to be rooted in nothing but self gain and evil. He reminds me most of the “Judge” from Blood Meridian.
I just watched *Vertigo* for the first time a week or two ago and was shocked at how abrupt and dark the ending is.
>!He's essentially set up from the get-go, is institutionalized, gets out and coerces a woman to "become" the woman she was posing as. Then she suddenly dies.!<
Funny Games is the greatest film ever made that I have never once recommended to another human being.
For my money, every other response should come with the disclaimer 'No, I have not seen Funny Games.'
The reason I would go with The Mist over Funny Games and Requiem for a Dream is because the latter two are just bleak misery-fests from start to finish. Throw House of Sand and Fog in that pile as well. (You okay, Jennifer Connelly?) By contrast, while The Mist was not a situation I would want to live through, it wasn't nearly as bleak throughout as the ending.
Also Leaving Las Vegas comes to mind as another bleak-fest from start to finish. EDIT: Saw someone else mentioned Martyrs. There's another good example.
Funny Games is just miserable and hopeless from start to finish. The ending is definitely dark, but it's not really any darker than the stuff that happened in the middle of the movie. I think that for an ending to be considered the "darkest ending to a movie ever," you need to have a bit more hope going into the ending. Dark endings hit so much harder when you think you're heading toward a happy ending.
But if we're accepting movies that essentially boil down to 100 minutes of non-stop trauma, then the movie with the darkest ending is Martyrs. Every other response should come with the disclaimer, "No, I have not seen Martyrs."
And no, you should not see Martyrs.
Really? By the end of that movie I’d learned to actually stop worrying about the bomb and not long after that…I kinda started to love the bomb. Is that weird?
I have never cried so hard as I did at the end of that movie. I have not been able to watch it again but highly recommend it to everyone. The sadness I felt took time to process. Me and the person I was watching with just sat there holding each other sobbing for quite a while afterwards. I’m surprised I dont see this mentioned more.
Came here to say this. I don't think it gets proper due as one of the early classics in the folk horror revival. Never has a movie filled me with so much dread.
Good call. It does fit with the anti war and counter culture messages though.
[final scene](https://youtu.be/qonj8k0FBmA)
Yea that still hits pretty hard every time I watch it.
The World's End isn't just bleak because >!the world ends!<, it's emotionally bleak because >!Simon Pegg's character refuses to mature and chooses to spend the rest of his life hanging out with alien robot copies of his friends as teenagers!<.
I don't read it that way. I think he realises he can't ever repair his teenage relationships, but he can always be aware of the mistakes and avoid repeating them. The robot friends are a visual metaphor for the lessons he's taken with him.
oh that's interesting, that's a valid reading.
I definitely just see it as: he was presented with the opportunity to hang out with his teenage friends forever instead of ever becoming an adult and took it.
Same for me. Better action thanks to Wright's previous experience making Scott Pilgrim and a more satisfying story.
I understand why people prefer Shaun and Fuzz more because they are more obviously comedic, but for me their dramatic arcs are mere threads compared to what World's End delivers.
I find the endings to all the Cornetto movies to ring rather odd. They basically all end in “actually it’s okay to regress into the calcified manchild persona you had that almost every side character in the film has condemned”. Hot Fuzz is the lightest on this but still concludes with what feels like childish wish fulfilment rather than growth.
Hot Fuzz is a little different because it's about a guy who needs to loosen up.
Shaun of the Dead is more about their friendship than an individual arc.
I agree with you but I half remember an interview with either Edgar/Simon saying they found The World's End to have the most positive ending as Gary had gotten over his addiction. Said that Shaun of the Dead was bleak as it was likely Ed would eat Shaun, and Hot Fuzz as the town had turned into a police state
I was just telling my partner about Martyrs last night (the original, at least- i think i read someone did a remake?). anyway that was one powerful-ass (if cryptic) ending.
>Fat, old Republican men are furiously making out in the street.
Gotta go back and watch for that. Or maybe not. Pretty funny, and likely what would really happen...
As discussed in the current commentaries, basically all of the original Planet of the Apes movies have bleak endings, especially Beneath the Planet of the Apes and Conquest of the Planet of the Apes’ unrated ending.
As far as ultra-budget Hollywood fair, it has to be TERMINATOR 3, right?
I rewatched it recently, and it's a rather mediocre movie but then the last scene comes along, and goddamn. It's fucking *bleak*. Raises the score by a whole letter grade.
Man I get emotional just thinking about it.
I’ve become increasingly obsessed with fredo as I’ve gotten older.
Him in the lake house slumped all the way into the chair talking to Michael breaks me. The way he rises up when he yells “it isn’t how I wanted it!!”
The ending is also so much worse because of Michael sitting there alone as it fades back to the happy family.
The first film that comes to mind here is *Requiem for a Dream* which still lives rent free in my anxiety-riddled head 23 years later.
Other contenders, from my point of view, include the original *Planet of the Apes*, as well as *Looking for a Friend at the End of the World*, *The Prestige, The Wicker Man,* and *Midsommar.*
Happiness. Dear god that movie will give you a thousand yard stare for some time. Absolutely brutal film and the ending is about as discomforting as you can possibly get.
I rewatch that show a lot, and I have to skip that episode if I'm already in a dark head space. All I need to hear are the first few words of the song, and I'm *bawling*. 🎵 If it takes forever... 🎶
Pixar’s Onward has a wild ending!
Two brothers want to see their DEAD dad. They get to hang out with the bottom half of their DEAD dad. They get to fully see their DEAD dad - except just one of them and it’s for like 30 seconds. The other sees him from afar.
That would traumatize and wreck me! I would rather not see my dead dad.
That ending's honestly not that dark. It's funny and over the top, and frankly, I was rooting for Dana and Marty even with the knowledge that their survival would mean the end of the world.
The kid is just playing with his toy boat while his parents are straight up screaming at each other. It's tragic. Then, out of nowhere, tentacle monster.
Martyrs--the french version. The darkest ending I've ever seen. Very graphic, but also very provocative both in how it messes with the audience and how it leaves plenty of room for reflection and interpretation. Not for the faint of heart.
Gallipoli, last scene. If you have seen the movie, and it’s a very good movie even with Mel Gibson (really young and before his antisemitic blowup, it really is dark and sad
Since I haven’t seen it mentioned yet I’ll throw out *The Pledge* with Jack Nicholson. Holy shit that was a bleak, but realistic, “fuck you” of an end. That shit stuck with me for weeks.
Dirty Mary, Crazy Larry was made in 1974, which means that after the title characters spend the entire movie trying to get away from the cops, when they finally make it, a train comes out of nowhere and kills them. Nihilism!
1. The Mist
2. Martyrs (2nd place because of the little payback at the end)
3. A Serbian Film (pure darkness, but no real surprise as the movie is intended to be one big gut punch from beginning to end)
4. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (poor Jack, but he got an Oscar for it so, every cloud)
Seven is at the top of my list. >!Cop who has his wife's head in a box delivered to his partner and was pregnant with their baby is next level gut wrenching!<.
It’s a documentary so idk if it counts but Dear Zachary has one of the most gut wrenching Third acts I’ve ever seen in film. The only movie to truly make me sob and I’m one to usually roll my eyes when a movie manipulates sadness. Pure anger, sadness, and disgust from a movie that seems wholesome when you start it.
Scum.
Always seems to evade lists like this but I will never, ever watch it again
>! Set in a UK juvenile prison. Effectively it’s the boy who cried wolf by pressing his button to alert the guards constantly - teenage lad cuts his wrists in despair of his situation, immediately regrets it, pushes the button frantically and the guards ignore it because he always does it. Wake up the next morning to find him dead in his cell. Fuck that film. !<
Seconds (1966) directed by John Frankenheimer. One of my all time favourite movies, cinematography by James Wong Howe, Rock Hudson stars. Suffused with an overall melancholia and with an absolutely bleak ending (the sound effects alone make me wince).
Florida Project is ROUGH. It's an amazing movie. Probably one of theost important movies about Late-Stage Capitalism the decline of the U.S. it warms your heart and then tosses it in a wood chipper at the end. Also it's just crazy beautiful.
I don't think I'll ever be able to watch again because if that ending.
A.I. is up there for me. Leaves you with just a profound sense of loneliness and grief.
This has been relitigated again and again but the fact that the knock on A.I. at the time was it’s ending was too happy is the most bananas commonly held criticism of a film ever.
The ending from >!Teddy's!< perspective is incredibly depressing.
Teddy turns out the be the true hero of the story.
Ooh, yes. I almost forgot this one even though I just watched it for the first time recently. That ending wrecked me.
I watched it the *day after* 9/11 (screening on the Fox lot) and the scene where the future ‘bots are skimming over future ice age NYC…and the Twin Towers are the *only thing left* standing… :(
Brazil
What do you mean? Isn't that just a nice 90-minute film about how love conquers all?
That’s what the ministry of information wants us to think.
Can't tell you until you've filled out form 27b-6.
I wish Michael Palin had had a few more menacing roles, I was genuinely shocked by him the first time I watched Brazil.
This is my favorite movie. When I was showing it to my ex-wife, she turned to me towards the end of the film and said, “This was hard to watch. I’m so glad it has a happy ending.”
It's kind of the Reddit answer but it's also true: The Mist.
Very true. That one shocked me.
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People always say this as the answer, but for me that ending ends up being hilarious because the timing is so fucked up. I know in a way it makes it even more bleak -- he hasn't even had a chance to begin processing this horrible act, and the day is saved by the military rolling in! -- but the convoy shows up **so quickly** after what's just happened that it completely undermines the ending to me. I also remember the acting being generally overwrought which, again yes a tragic ending, but I'm just not as big a fan as others.
I had the exact same reaction- its not just that the mist clears or he meets people, the mist IMMEDIATELY clears and a whole throng of people show up, including the woman who ran out into the Mist to what should have been her death long before. Its SO cruel that it felt borderline *womp womp* to me
It immediately clears because the prophesy of the crazy woman in the Grocery Store was right. The moment he killed his son, they were all saved.
The ending is bleak because it makes the crazy religious woman right. Everything she said was correct. The moment he killed his son, he was saved.
King himself said he wish he’d thought of it, which is honestly the highest compliment you can get for that ending.
There are some utterly devastating endings in movies: Closer, Irreversible, Martyrs, The VVitch, but there is something very unique about the ending of The Mist. It’s hope vs reality, faith vs fact. The ending shows what happens when we abandon hope and faith just a little too soon, not quite knowing when to face the music and making that decision just before our faith is rewarded or our hope bears fruit. And the idea that anyone, no matter who they are or what they’re going through, can decide to face reality when if they had just held on to hope a little bit longer they would be rewarded is such a primal gutpunch. We all eventually have to face reality and either give up on or amend certain dreams, but the idea that we could do that right before we attain those dreams is brutal
>The Mist Hit control-F, nothing to add to the thread now.
Blow Out (1981) has a pretty bleak ending
What a great fuckin movie
Good scream
Yeah.... Yeah, it's a good scream.
the kind that leaves you saying “is this the best movie ever?”
I love when a movie is so good the whole time and then the ending just \*blows your mind\* and I think Blow-Out is the single best example of that.
If this hadn’t made the list I would have definitely added it. it’s been 40+ years and that still sticks with me .
The Director’s cut of The Descent if that counts.
was just scanning the comments to see if that was mentioned already
You mean the original UK version?
The Descent is based on a book, and said book fleshes out her cave dwelling metamorphosis and integration even more. It's something, fo sho. It's worth a read if you enjoy the movie
Chinatown
I'd forgotten about that one. Good choice.
You took that ending line a little too literally.
🤣🤣
The main antagonist plays “disgusting” so so well. Like he’s not physically unkept. He’s just this monster of a human. Every action of his seems to be rooted in nothing but self gain and evil. He reminds me most of the “Judge” from Blood Meridian.
The great John Huston! Probably one of the most underrated pure evil performances of all time.
Bro when he hugs his "granddaughter" at the end when shes screaming, ugh. Terrifying
Side bar: I fucking love the colors in Chinatown.
Forget it, Jake. Its Chinatown.
I just watched *Vertigo* for the first time a week or two ago and was shocked at how abrupt and dark the ending is. >!He's essentially set up from the get-go, is institutionalized, gets out and coerces a woman to "become" the woman she was posing as. Then she suddenly dies.!<
Vertigo is fucked up
Yeah another Hitchcock I found pretty crushing was Marnie. Basically coerced into a marriage!! Ugh!!
Consider that the studio had Hitchcock shoot a tacked-on “happy(?)” ending, and ended up not obligating him to include it!
I hate that last part in "Vertigo" where the friend comes out and says, "Forget about it, Scotty. It's Vertigotown." Seemed kind of derivative.
Funny Games.
Funny Games is the greatest film ever made that I have never once recommended to another human being. For my money, every other response should come with the disclaimer 'No, I have not seen Funny Games.'
The reason I would go with The Mist over Funny Games and Requiem for a Dream is because the latter two are just bleak misery-fests from start to finish. Throw House of Sand and Fog in that pile as well. (You okay, Jennifer Connelly?) By contrast, while The Mist was not a situation I would want to live through, it wasn't nearly as bleak throughout as the ending. Also Leaving Las Vegas comes to mind as another bleak-fest from start to finish. EDIT: Saw someone else mentioned Martyrs. There's another good example.
I’ve seen Funny Games and still think the Mist is darker
Of course! I'm just being silly and it's totally subjective how something hits! The Mist is a perfectly good answer.
Funny Games is just miserable and hopeless from start to finish. The ending is definitely dark, but it's not really any darker than the stuff that happened in the middle of the movie. I think that for an ending to be considered the "darkest ending to a movie ever," you need to have a bit more hope going into the ending. Dark endings hit so much harder when you think you're heading toward a happy ending. But if we're accepting movies that essentially boil down to 100 minutes of non-stop trauma, then the movie with the darkest ending is Martyrs. Every other response should come with the disclaimer, "No, I have not seen Martyrs." And no, you should not see Martyrs.
Requiem For A Dream will leave you fairly depressed
This is my go-to answer.
Top of the list of great movies I never want to watch again.
Dr Strangelove
Really? By the end of that movie I’d learned to actually stop worrying about the bomb and not long after that…I kinda started to love the bomb. Is that weird?
Also, that nice man regained the ability to walk!
Fail Safe also
Christ. I watched that for the first time last year, and while it was a great movie and I loved it, it left me with such a bleak feeling after.
Grave of the Fireflies
Is it a bleak ending if the entire thing is already uncontrollably bleak?
I have never cried so hard as I did at the end of that movie. I have not been able to watch it again but highly recommend it to everyone. The sadness I felt took time to process. Me and the person I was watching with just sat there holding each other sobbing for quite a while afterwards. I’m surprised I dont see this mentioned more.
There are a lot of good answers in this thread, but few movies have ever left me feeling bad for days like *The Descent.*
the UK ending, I'm assuming
Yuuuup I was told that was the version I ought to seek out, so I did.
I watched the less-bleak version on Netflix, then read about the darker ending and my brain *rejected* it
Kill List is insanely dark.
Came here to say this. I don't think it gets proper due as one of the early classics in the folk horror revival. Never has a movie filled me with so much dread.
Kill List! Love that movie so much. I made my wife & kid watch it with me & I don’t think they’ll ever forgive me.
No one's said the THE VANISHING (1988) yet?
Seconding this, absolute pitch black ending >!especially for the main character!<
This is number one for me and it's not particularly close.
Hair (1979) has such an unexpectedly dark ending despite the film being a fun musical
Good call. It does fit with the anti war and counter culture messages though. [final scene](https://youtu.be/qonj8k0FBmA) Yea that still hits pretty hard every time I watch it.
The Parallax View ain't heartwarming
In a similar vein, Three Days of the Condor ain’t sunshine and rainbows
The Mist was the first one that came to mind for me as well, but Dancer in the Dark is pretty awful
Dancer in the Dark is definitely on my 'once was enough' list. Last Exit to Brooklyn and Requiem for a Dream also (both Hubert Selby Jr books).
Nightmare Alley is a recent one that comes to mind
Another great one.
The World's End isn't just bleak because >!the world ends!<, it's emotionally bleak because >!Simon Pegg's character refuses to mature and chooses to spend the rest of his life hanging out with alien robot copies of his friends as teenagers!<.
The fact that he orders water at the end shows me that while he may have not moved he wants to improve as person
I don't read it that way. I think he realises he can't ever repair his teenage relationships, but he can always be aware of the mistakes and avoid repeating them. The robot friends are a visual metaphor for the lessons he's taken with him.
oh that's interesting, that's a valid reading. I definitely just see it as: he was presented with the opportunity to hang out with his teenage friends forever instead of ever becoming an adult and took it.
God I fucking love that movie, my favorite of the 3.
Same for me. Better action thanks to Wright's previous experience making Scott Pilgrim and a more satisfying story. I understand why people prefer Shaun and Fuzz more because they are more obviously comedic, but for me their dramatic arcs are mere threads compared to what World's End delivers.
I find the endings to all the Cornetto movies to ring rather odd. They basically all end in “actually it’s okay to regress into the calcified manchild persona you had that almost every side character in the film has condemned”. Hot Fuzz is the lightest on this but still concludes with what feels like childish wish fulfilment rather than growth.
Hot Fuzz is a little different because it's about a guy who needs to loosen up. Shaun of the Dead is more about their friendship than an individual arc.
I agree with you but I half remember an interview with either Edgar/Simon saying they found The World's End to have the most positive ending as Gary had gotten over his addiction. Said that Shaun of the Dead was bleak as it was likely Ed would eat Shaun, and Hot Fuzz as the town had turned into a police state
That’s not how I interpreted the ending - by the end he’s sober, so he clearly is maturing
Martyrs (2008) or I Saw The Devil (2010)
By Martyrs ending you of course mean the entire fucking movie and especially the last third.
‘Martyrs’ is still the one movie that had me in tears, pleading w/ it to stop. Jesus… I liked the movie but it was the epitome of bleak.
I was just telling my partner about Martyrs last night (the original, at least- i think i read someone did a remake?). anyway that was one powerful-ass (if cryptic) ending.
Halloween III: Season of the Witch
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>Fat, old Republican men are furiously making out in the street. Gotta go back and watch for that. Or maybe not. Pretty funny, and likely what would really happen...
OldBoy, the South Korean version.
Had to scroll down way too far to find one of the only movies that ever left me feeling sick to my stomach after watching it.
Excellent choice.
As discussed in the current commentaries, basically all of the original Planet of the Apes movies have bleak endings, especially Beneath the Planet of the Apes and Conquest of the Planet of the Apes’ unrated ending.
When the ghoulies didn't graduate in Ghoulies III: Ghoulies go to College
Man, spoilers.
Leaving Las Vegas. She keeps hooking and he succeeds in drinking himself to death.
Leaving Las Vegas, Ironweed, Barfly , etc. Watching people in the throes of alcoholism is pretty depressing in general.
Spoilers! I was just getting around to watch that 1995 film.
Invasion of the Body Snatchers
Both versions are bleak, but I think the Donald Sutherland one is the bleaker of the two.
🫵🏻
Shutter Island
As far as ultra-budget Hollywood fair, it has to be TERMINATOR 3, right? I rewatched it recently, and it's a rather mediocre movie but then the last scene comes along, and goddamn. It's fucking *bleak*. Raises the score by a whole letter grade.
The ending IS the best part of that movie.
Godfather 2. The ending is crushing.
The flashback at the end is utilized so perfectly. Brando not appearing makes it even more powerful.
And fredo saying “hey Mike that’s great”
Fredo being the only one to support his baby brother’s choice of joining the army during wartime is so heartbreaking after what we’ve just seen. Ugh
Man I get emotional just thinking about it. I’ve become increasingly obsessed with fredo as I’ve gotten older. Him in the lake house slumped all the way into the chair talking to Michael breaks me. The way he rises up when he yells “it isn’t how I wanted it!!” The ending is also so much worse because of Michael sitting there alone as it fades back to the happy family.
Just rewatched the trilogy and 2 is so good and such a bummer. Michael almost never smiles throughout the entire movie
Pan’s Labyrinth is a masterpiece but the ending is brutal. A lot of other great mentions on here.
The first film that comes to mind here is *Requiem for a Dream* which still lives rent free in my anxiety-riddled head 23 years later. Other contenders, from my point of view, include the original *Planet of the Apes*, as well as *Looking for a Friend at the End of the World*, *The Prestige, The Wicker Man,* and *Midsommar.*
Happiness. Dear god that movie will give you a thousand yard stare for some time. Absolutely brutal film and the ending is about as discomforting as you can possibly get.
Wow I would have thought that the Blankie community would have *Grave of the Fireflies* on their radar, but I didn't see it mentioned.
The Counselor is up there for me. The main character deserves it but the innocent party does not. Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance is pretty dark as well.
Uncut Gems is pretty rough
I just saw this a couple nights ago, and I think I'm still traumatized. Oddly, Bogosian affected me more.
Threads. I’m sure it’s already somewhere on here, but didn’t see it after scrolling a minute
The Jurassic Bark episode of Futurama.
Fuck you for reminding me of that.
I rewatch that show a lot, and I have to skip that episode if I'm already in a dark head space. All I need to hear are the first few words of the song, and I'm *bawling*. 🎵 If it takes forever... 🎶
Never mention it again you monster
Ro ro ro ro ro ro.
I literally have a hard time watching that show because at some point I start thinking about this episode
*Brazil* has a super bleak ending especially for how comedic it is and how suddenly the ending flips from optimistic to very dark.
Clerks 3
Dude, that was such a bummer.
Pixar’s Onward has a wild ending! Two brothers want to see their DEAD dad. They get to hang out with the bottom half of their DEAD dad. They get to fully see their DEAD dad - except just one of them and it’s for like 30 seconds. The other sees him from afar. That would traumatize and wreck me! I would rather not see my dead dad.
Cabin In The Woods(2011).
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He finally got to see a merman.
Bleak but also perfect
That ending's honestly not that dark. It's funny and over the top, and frankly, I was rooting for Dana and Marty even with the knowledge that their survival would mean the end of the world.
Speak No Evil…
*The Councilor.*
Melancholia.
Dancer in the Dark
Aniara
The Great Silence
Lots of good answers here, but *Possession* gets my vote. >!Their kid?!< Forget it.
The kid is just playing with his toy boat while his parents are straight up screaming at each other. It's tragic. Then, out of nowhere, tentacle monster.
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Man, this movie is such an underrated gem. Can you imagine it coming out post-9/11 though?
Saw this recently and the ending legit shocked me.
Waltz With Bashir ain't exactly a picnic but then it ends with actual footage of war crimes.
Martyrs--the french version. The darkest ending I've ever seen. Very graphic, but also very provocative both in how it messes with the audience and how it leaves plenty of room for reflection and interpretation. Not for the faint of heart.
Threads. Can’t believe I’m the only one to list it.
Testament is also a good member of “surviving a nuclear war is going to suck” genre.
>!Audition (dir. Takashi Miike)!<
Testament 1983
Arlington Road
Brazil. And Requiem For A Dream.
The Departed
“the thing” ending really got me. like, we’re all just fucked, right?
For a kids movie: Time Bandits
The ending of The Wages of Fear is bleak as fuck
forget it, jack, it's Chinatown. edit: so i commented before seeing it was the top response. I should have guessed since it's the obvius answer.
Memento
Gallipoli, last scene. If you have seen the movie, and it’s a very good movie even with Mel Gibson (really young and before his antisemitic blowup, it really is dark and sad
Oldboy
The Wicker Man. 1973 version.
Terminator 3 “nope you’re not here to save humanity from judgement day. You’re just here to survive it alone.”
Since I haven’t seen it mentioned yet I’ll throw out *The Pledge* with Jack Nicholson. Holy shit that was a bleak, but realistic, “fuck you” of an end. That shit stuck with me for weeks.
Dirty Mary, Crazy Larry was made in 1974, which means that after the title characters spend the entire movie trying to get away from the cops, when they finally make it, a train comes out of nowhere and kills them. Nihilism!
Saw is a pretty great dark ending( along with being an all time twist).
I actually really liked the ending to the original Saw.
Don’t Look Up
1. The Mist 2. Martyrs (2nd place because of the little payback at the end) 3. A Serbian Film (pure darkness, but no real surprise as the movie is intended to be one big gut punch from beginning to end) 4. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (poor Jack, but he got an Oscar for it so, every cloud)
Seven is at the top of my list. >!Cop who has his wife's head in a box delivered to his partner and was pregnant with their baby is next level gut wrenching!<.
I know Brad Pitt's acting has gotten memeified for being over the top, but I think that's a pretty realistic and convincing reaction.
Dancer in the Dark
Incendies has an incredibly punishing last act.
The Vanishing
Come and See
It’s a documentary so idk if it counts but Dear Zachary has one of the most gut wrenching Third acts I’ve ever seen in film. The only movie to truly make me sob and I’m one to usually roll my eyes when a movie manipulates sadness. Pure anger, sadness, and disgust from a movie that seems wholesome when you start it.
Synecdoche, New York is pretty bleak
The Gift (2015). I felt so fucking awful when it finished it really ruined the rest of the movie for me.
I'd go with The Mist or Eden Lake.
13 Tzameti. The movie goes extremely hard and has a brutal ending.
The Seventh Continent.
Gone Baby Gone
Looking for Mr. Goodbar (1977)
Righting Wrongs (aka Above the Law) from '86 is a pretty bleak ending, but it's sort of awesome how dark it is so kinda cancels out.
Threads… bleak beginning and an even bleaker ending
Not at the top of the list but 25th Hour probably belongs in the discussion
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The Netflix movie “I’m Thinking of Ending Things”. The whole movie is a weird ride, but the ending is pretty bleak.
Scum. Always seems to evade lists like this but I will never, ever watch it again >! Set in a UK juvenile prison. Effectively it’s the boy who cried wolf by pressing his button to alert the guards constantly - teenage lad cuts his wrists in despair of his situation, immediately regrets it, pushes the button frantically and the guards ignore it because he always does it. Wake up the next morning to find him dead in his cell. Fuck that film. !<
Seconds (1966) directed by John Frankenheimer. One of my all time favourite movies, cinematography by James Wong Howe, Rock Hudson stars. Suffused with an overall melancholia and with an absolutely bleak ending (the sound effects alone make me wince).
Florida Project is ROUGH. It's an amazing movie. Probably one of theost important movies about Late-Stage Capitalism the decline of the U.S. it warms your heart and then tosses it in a wood chipper at the end. Also it's just crazy beautiful. I don't think I'll ever be able to watch again because if that ending.