Have you heard? Fight Club recently turned up on Chinese streaming service Tencent Video with a different ending. As The Guardian explains (via film critic Courtney Howard):
The Narrator still kills off Durden, but the exploding building scene is replaced with a black screen and a coda: “The police rapidly figured out the whole plan and arrested all criminals, successfully preventing the bomb from exploding”.
But my head is exploding. You’d think that China, its penchant for censoring everything Western aside, would have liked the original anticapitalist message.
Anyway, it got me wondering: What movie that you love would you change the ending of, and how?
I would not change the ending of Fight Club, by the way. But I might change the ending of Titanic, just to have Jack survive. That would have been nice for both him and Rose.
Your turn…
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Superman II comes to mind. Not only is the “super-forgetting-kiss” a stupid extra power for a guy who already has plenty, it’s bad drama too. Either Superman has to forego romance, or he doesn’t… which means he’s just messing around with these women in Superman III and IV? Not a good look for Kal-El.
Wouldn’t it have been more satisfying if he said something like “I’ve decided I’m not going to let a bunch of dead guys from a dead planet tell me what to do from a computer crystal anymore?”
I love the new West Side Story, but the ending feels rushed to me and doesn’t land as strongly as I think it could. I think it could be improved by giving more screen time to Valentina at the end. I think Tony’s death would be more powerful if we got to see her reaction to it, since he was like a son to her. And I’d really like to see her walk with Maria in the procession behind his body instead of standing with Chino. I think it would be really moving to have her comfort Maria and show that Tony’s death affects more than just Maria.
I know it would be inconsistent with the original (show and film), but I still wish Maria died along with Tony, as in Shakespeare and the Greek myth
– in this case, it would be so we could also see Anita’s third act decision rebounding onto her – Anita should be a witness to these final events – where she sees her own impulsive act of anger and hatred has ended up killing her beloved friend, and must then live with this also, realizing how her anger has made her situation even worse – so we’d see the ripple effect of this tragedy
(Maria could shoot herself, like Juliet, maybe with Anita crying for her to stop, or Chino’s bullet could kill them both together – maybe Chino doesn’t see her behind Tony as he shoots – and we see the payoff for when the gunsellers described how powerful this gun really was, tearing through both bodies)
– and that might even be a stronger impetus to this larger social reaction among them at the conclusion, that this cycle of tribal vengeance needs to STOP
I know, in the current versions, Maria is a kind of casualty in terms of her innocence, and her discovery of hatred – I thought in both films this wasn’t quite strong enough
– especially considering in our culture how often this kind of vengeful brandishing of weapons is shown in a triumphant light – as in showing the hero discovering his (or her) backbone
– a film like this, that’s trying to address our larger social attitudes to violence and other issues, needs to come down even harder about this at the very end, I think
“we could also see Anita’s third act decision rebounding onto her – Anita should be a witness to these final events – where she sees her own impulsive act of anger and hatred has ended up killing her beloved friend, and must then live with this also, realizing how her anger has made her situation even worse – so we’d see the ripple effect of this tragedy”
I only recently watched the original, but this is why I think Tony should have killed himself. The set-up was there, Anita lying would lead to Tony’s suicide, but then he’s arbitrarily shot instead. Doesn’t kill the movie, but weakens it IMO.
Interesting point – I think they’re using this expanding cycle of violence to make the point that it’s the community that’s killing itself, over and above any individual or couple – but you’re right – the classical tragic ending we see in Romeo and Juliet (or Pyramus and Thisbe) is so potent because it’s so concentrated that way
I’d change the ending of Silver Linings Playbook and As Good as It Gets, both in the same way. I’d take out the happy ending where the characters realize they’re in love and meant to be together. Both of the movies were about damaged, unstable people learning to function in the world again. The happy ending, if you call it that, is that they can go to a dance or visit a bakery without anyone getting injured or insulted. Maybe they even have some small victory to celebrate. But the characters felt nowhere near ready to be in a romantic relationship.
I can celebrate with them without seeing a Hollywood kiss, and when I got one, anyway, it felt phony to me. It felt like a scene that was in the movie because the same thing worked in another movie. I’d rather have a small, ambiguous moment of healing than a romantic gesture that I don’t believe for a second.
Avengers: Endgame. Steve belongs with Bucky, not with Peggy. :-)
No, seriously: he was in an entire Captain America trilogy whose thematic throughline was “I’m going to stick with my best friend, no matter what”; his motto, when it isn’t “I can do this all day,” is “I’m with you til the end of the line”; Bucky is his only living link to his past, and the only one who shares his experience of being men out of their time… and he’s going to leave Bucky stranded, damaged, and alone in the present, for a woman he probably spent two weeks with at most? Guess “the end of the line” isn’t what I thought it meant.
(Also, Peggy is incredible on her own, without her happily-ever-after with Steve. Look what she accomplished in Agent Carter, and as Captain Carter in the What If? series.)
China is cosplaying as a communist nation. It’s really an authoritarian capitalist one.
yes, i wasn’t surprised at their “ending”… they want the “authorities” (cops, military, party leaders) to be respected and thought of as best for their society.
Chuck Palahniuk seems bemused by the whole mess, since his book and the film have been altered and censored many times before:
https://ew.com/movies/fight-club-censored-ending-china-chuck-palahniuk/
Tangent: I considered writing something about Dead Poets Society, but I think I hate both the ending and the film too much to try to save them.
The book’s author Chuck Palahniuk has just raised some qualifying points to counter the prevailing outrage, in this excerpt from The Guardian:
‘“The strange flip side is that in many foreign markets the publisher rewrote the novel so it would end like the film,” (Palahniuk) wrote. “Without permission, I might add.”
‘Palahniuk added to TMZ: “What I find really interesting is that my books are heavily banned throughout the US. The Texas prison system refuses to carry my books in their libraries. A lot of public schools and most private schools refuse to carry my books. But it’s only an issue once China changes the end of a movie? I’ve been putting up with book-banning for a long time.”’
That said, I prefer Fincher’s zeitgeist film to the book, and I’m supportive of any initiatives against censorship – indeed, I wonder if the concept of free speech even exists anymore, now that most of our communication now takes place on vast electronic platforms, that are private property, where all of us in our billions are just “guests”, not even tenants, whose access to these platforms and their audiences may be legally revoked anytime, and arbitrarily, by these corporate “owners”, who are like our new feudal landlords.
Bringing up this topic is like trying to discuss water with a fish. As a society, do we even know how to talk anymore about our needs regarding the free circulation of thought, culture, and ideas? I think we’re long past due for a rethinking of our media industry, in the same way that Medicare for All has popularized calls to reshape our healthcare industry.
Nowadays IMO talk of this or that censorship needs to dovetail into talk of the media and cultural industry as a whole, how these are supposed to function, and what’s really needed for our discourse to emerge and circulate as it should in a truly free and democratic society.
But I love your question here, and so here are some examples of films where I’d change the ending. I’ll (sort of) stick to films where the ending seems like a retreat from the possibly daring or original direction the film has been taking:
FANTASTIC FOUR (2015)
– say what you like about the film, but the last 30 minutes or so is simply butchered by the producers, and I’d at least like a version that fully shows the director’s intent – if he’s to be trashed, at least give him a chance to be trashed on his own terms
ONCE UPON A TIME IN HOLLYWOOD
I feel like this movie is building up towards a huge confrontation between Leo DiCaprio and Brad Pitt – they have this sort of marriage, where dissolute Leo cries on his devoted servant Brad’s shoulder one moment and blithely neglects him the next – where Pitt is this strong, silent type brimming with repressed violence and buried resentment – this (Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant) dynamic is the best aspect of the film, begging for some kind of twist or explosion between them that then never happens – instead, this implicit antagonism gets projected onto the women and the hippies
CHANGING LANES
– the trajectory of this film has been for these two antagonists to increasingly confront who they really are, and accordingly change their attitudes about what they’re chasing – all of this is discarded in a deus ex machina “happy” ending where they get to revert to their original goals
POTC DEAD MAN’S CHEST
– very daring in the way it shows Elizabeth and Jack gradually changing places morally – but in the coda it makes no sense for everyone to suddenly embark on a quest to save Jack
RETURN OF THE KING
– yes, that’s right – it should end with everyone bowing to the hobbits – but if they really want to follow the trajectory, then Sam should be forced to kill Frodo to destroy the Ring
BRAZIL
– actually, either ending works – since the initially studio imposed “happy” ending is filmed so as to feel like a hallucination anyway
TITANIC
– the ship should NOT sink (just kidding)
STRANGE DAYS
– the real murderers should not turn out to be “rogue” aberrations, and we should not see that grotesque reworking of the Rodney King beating as an interracial love-fest; the storyline should continue to implicate the racism of the larger system – see Glass Shield for an example of this
AVATAR
– the Na’vi should lead their own forces to defend their world; they should have killed Jake immediately for his devastating betrayal, or he should be forced to die defending them to redeem himself, or remain a stigmatized outsider – their sudden embrace of Jake as their “messiah” following his shock and awe tactics strikes me as racist, exactly as if Quarritch himself had written this part of the screenplay (the whole film should have been from Neytiri’s POV instead of Jake’s – like Pocohontas in Malick’s New World)
HULK
– no, I like that ending – I just wish it were filmed so we could see that confrontation more clearly
DEVIL WEARS PRADA
Don’t soften Meryl Streep’s character at the end by showing her “appreciating” Anne Hathaway – let them remain deadly enemies, even if Hathaway’s victory has ended the conflict – for that matter, let Hathaway ditch her useless, self-indulgent boyfriend – or let her embrace him and reject the jet set world that Streep represents – decide what the film is actually about
WOLF
A mild mannered publisher is bitten by a wolf and turns into Jack Nicholson – but let the movie decide if this is a blessing or curse – the point is that now he actually fits into the newly corporatized shark culture of his environment – so let him embrace this, like Tim Robbins does, Macbeth-like, in The Player, once he’s tasted blood, and, like Altman, leave the audience to process the implications of this
DARK KNIGHT
– they should have found a way to implicate Bruce and Gordon more thoroughly to justify Dent’s blaming them, inviting us to share Dent’s revulsion towards them and even wonder if he’s the protagonist here, instead of emphasizing his new “evil” – see W Delta Z for an example of this
WONDER WOMAN
– Ares, in his true form – couldn’t they at least change his moustache? And what’s the point of defeating him, exactly? Does it stop the war? Maybe they should reconcile instead
THOR: DARK WORLD
– don’t show Loki’s return here – leave us with the lasting impact of that death scene, which is more satisfying than his death in Infinity War
ENDGAME
– Bucky is the one who should have gone back to live a different life, rather than Steve – or Bucky should have died redeeming himself – how can they rehabilitate the character who killed Tony Stark’s parents?
IRON MAN 2
– remove this reconciliation with Tony’s father – let the father remain the avaricious bastard who ruined Ivan’s family, whose memory torments Tony – sentimentalizing the father takes the fangs out of the whole movie, and deflates the challenging moral force behind Rourke’s portrayal – also, revise that whole collaboration between Ivan and Justin Hammer – the whole movie falls flat henceforth
CAPTAIN AMERICA
– don’t make him fall into the ice immediately after that adventure – at least indicate a time lapse to suggest that he had further adventures before this happens – to further justify his legend – and to give him time to have actually acquired these strategic skills he’s supposed to have in Avengers
RISE OF THE PLANET OF THE APES
– ok, they’re intelligent now, fine – but then how do they suddenly and immediately know how to organize? (or aim guns on horseback, in the sequel) – we needed another whole film, an ape version of Battle of Algiers, to show them figuring this out
IRON MAN
– Obadiah Stane should get the hell out of there with his suit and regroup, now that he’s discovered – why does he suddenly decide to turn into King Kong?
Q & A
– Nick Nolte’s character should get the hell out of there and regroup, now that he’s discovered – why does he suddenly decide to turn into King Kong?
INTERNAL AFFAIRS
– Richard Gere’s Iago should get the hell out of there and regroup, now that he’s discovered – why does he suddenly decide to turn into King Kong?
NIGHTHAWKS
– Rutger Hauer’s character should get the hell out of there and regroup, now that he’s defeated – why does he suddenly decide to turn into King Kong?
IN THE BLOOD
– Gina Carano should get to kill that nasty bad guy herself, in the gratuitous, shamelessly triumphant style that’s characterized the film thus far, after what he did to her husband – wtf is this business all of a sudden with Danny Trejo stepping in and giving some stupid speech?
IRON MAN 3
Pepper Potts should get to remain a badass molten superhero (she should also have inherited Stark’s legacy, obviously, rather than Peter Parker)
KING KONG
– the ape should survive – just kidding – but he should have a final confrontation with Carl Denham, who’s been his true adversary throughout – the film should show clearly which of these titanic egos wins, or at least give Denham a clearer comeuppance – the ’76 version handles this most clearly
NO WAY HOME
Serious issues with this film – but in the end Peter shouldn’t end up totally isolated like that – I’d prefer a reboot where he basically just began again with everyone as he had been just before meeting Tony Stark – a great thing about the MCU version, esp Homecoming, was his dynamics within his community
Is that really fair, though? Most people seem to be more amused than anything else by the new Chinese ending, and PLENTY of ordinary people and free-speech and literary organizations are constantly investigating, reporting on, and protesting book bans.
Also: You have a lot of films you’d change!
What is that song about having one’s “‘druthers” – sigh
Is this kind of giddy frustration part and parcel of loving movies – or is it an addiction, maybe an adrenaline fix? I don’t know – I didn’t expect so many movies to pop up – mea culpa lol
Nice point about this vigilance for free speech – it’s nice to hear some good news for a change, thanks
does it have to be a movie, because i would totally rewrite the entire last season of game of thrones.
Excellent.
I just came across this unused, alternate ending for Frozen 2:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9QycoP_nruY&ab_channel=SCRFilms
As happy as I am with the movie’s actual ending, I think I would have loved this version too. Having Arendelle actually be destroyed (with the promise of rebuilding it) would have tied in very strongly with the film’s theme of atoning for the past (and current conversations about how we should rethink the systems we live in wholesale). And I would have loved seeing Anna get some closure with her parents and be recognized for the powerful character that she is (“her love could hold up the world”).
I’d have changed the beginning of Alien³… indeed, there are many sequels that retroactively spoil earlier films. But that’s another question.
Apollo 18 opens beautifully with menacing space exploration, then about half way through falls into dreary generic horror. The Last Days on Mars lost all interest for me about 35 minutes in when it turned into zombie horror-action. But neither of those is really an “ending” change.
The postscript to Contagion, the flashback showing howthe initial infection happened, spoiled the mood for me. Yeah, we’d worked that out already, thanks. Yeah, we know it could happen again. So what?