Post #27: The End(ing)

It's strange, but some of my favorite films, books, and short stories are not ones that I would say have the best and most memorable endings.  I loved them for other reasons; maybe they stick in my mind because of the crazy and twisted plot, because of the unexpected and entertaining characters, or because the writing was absolutely superb.  But even the best films, books, and short stories I have ever seen may not know how to end a story well.

Some great endings to films that I have seen have come from The Departed, Million Dollar Baby, and Titanic.  Each of these ending are extremely well and almost perfectly sum up the story of the film.

In The Departed, the movie ends with Mark Wahlberg killing Matt Damon and a rat scurrying across the windowsill.  This was a perfect ending, actually the first thing I thought of when asked, "What is a good ending?"  There is that element of foreshadowing, as the purpose of the movie is for the Boston police to find the "rat" infiltrating their force and for the Irish mob to find the "rat" hidden among their men.  And, as Leo DiCaprio and Matt Damon had both been brutally murdered, the actual rat running across the windowsill is the only "rat" to survive.  There is no other word to describe how I felt at the end of this film but excited.  First of all, I was excited because the bad guys didn't get away with their plan--the good guys didn't, either, but I'd rather have nobody win than a victory for the enemy.  Secondly, and most importantly, having an actual live rat in the last seconds of the film ties everything together.  You know that feeling when you finally see how the elements of a story connect, and you think you are the smartest person in the world for realizing it?  That's how I felt.  That's why I was excited.

Whereas The Departed ended in a way that was memorable for its cleverness, Million Dollar Baby's ending made me sad.  Clint Eastwood follows Hilary Swank's wishes and pulls the plug--literally--on her breathing machine and walks away, and Morgan Freeman ends his letter to Clint's estranged daughter.  Ninety-nine percent of the time, we view people who kill other people as evil, but Clint Eastwood is different.  What he does is illegal, but he is complying with Hilary's dying wish.  He doesn't want her to die, but he puts her happiness ahead of his own.  He is like a best friend and father combined, and maybe, as Morgan Freeman suggest, Clint's own daughter can recognize this, too.  That ending made me hate the movie, but hate it in a good way.  Hate it because it killed me to watch, killed me that this girl who came from such a horrible life ended up dying, when she deserved so much
better--not because I didn't enjoy watching it.  It was the right ending for the film.



I, too, am a sucker for happy endings, so when Titanic ended with Young Rose finding Jack at the top of the stairs in the ship's ballroom in Heaven, I couldn't stop bawling.  The film is a love story, and so of course, it has to end with the two people together in some way; preferably physically, but if not, at least spiritually.  I am a very emotional person--sometimes too much so--so I cried a ton when Jack dies, and I cried a ton--happy tears this time--when he and Rose finally find each other in the afterlife in the end.  Had they still been alive, this would have been every girl's fantasy; two people utterly in love and finding each other for the first time after years apart.  However, it's not so much this fantasy that makes this ending memorable; it the fact that after all these characters have gone through, they are finally getting their happy ending.  Like I said, I am a sucker for happy endings.

Some great endings that I have read/seen in works of literature have come from Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Thirteen Reasons Why, and Les Miserables.  Some are ordinary, or offer a simple message, but they are still unforgettable.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows ends the present story with Harry having just defeated the darkest wizard who ever lived, and even in his glory, he remains modest and just wants everything to go back to normal--or as normal as it ever was.  After seeing Voldemort, Young Dumbledore, and Grindelwald, Harry realizes how crazy and evil immense power can make a person and he locks up the Elder Wand where no one can ever get to it.  This almost makes me feel bad about myself; Harry has suffered so much and always pushed through it, has seen others suffer and has always fought for them, and now that he is probably the most loved and admired person in all of the Wizarding World, he doesn't even try to take advantage of it.  That is why it's memorable; such a good person could be considered cheesy, but the genuineness of his character make him an aspiration, not someone to mock.  The epilogue of Harry's future is just as good, because it provides me closure with the characters.  That is probably the number one thing I need when it comes to moving on from a situation: closure.  I need to know how it all ends, that everyone will be okay.  And showing me how Harry, Ron, Hermione, and their families end up gives me that, so I can finally move on (as hard as it is to move on from Harry Potter).

The ending of Thirteen Reasons Why is another ending that I really enjoyed.  Again, not because I actually liked it, but because it fit the story and made sense.  In the end of Thirteen Reasons Why, Clay Jensen packs up Hannah Baker's seven tapes, the thirteen reasons why she committed suicide, and ships them off to the next person intended to hear the tapes.  There is nothing out of the ordinary that happens in the end, just the fact that Clay is now miserable because of these tapes, and the next person on the list is destined for that same fate.  It's this kind of thing that I can relate to the most, because it can so easily happen in real life.  Though these stories occur externally from Clay, they have an enormous impact, messing with his emotions, triggering his internal struggle, and destroying his preconceived ideas about reality.  Maybe all that happens in the end is that Clay packs up a box and takes it to the post office, but under the surface, between the lines, lies so much more: everything that people don't want to acknowledge.

Les Miserables is my favorite play of all that I have ever seen, and it is the ending in part that makes an impact on me.  Each character has had their own struggles--whether that be always being on the run, being forced into prostitution to save her daughter, fighting the government because of their mistreatment of the public, etc.--and yet they still steadfastly believe that love conquers all.  Maybe this is a cheesy statement, that "love conquers all," but it is still true.  The bishop excuses Jean val Jean for stealing, and gives him a new chance at life.  Fantine, who loved her daughter with all of her being, died so that Cosette could have a better life.  Jean val Jean, who had been running from Javert's wrath for years and years, finally has the chance to kill him, but his love is what finally makes the policeman back off.  And, connecting them all, having given Cosette a loving home is what makes Fantine takes Jean val Jean to heaven.  In the end, it is being a good person that makes not just your life worthwhile, but the others' lives around you, as well.

Lastly, short stories.  I am fairly picky about the endings I like, especially in short stories, because with so little time to state the plot, there is even less time to end the story in a satisfactory way.  But, here is one that I think did a pretty good job.

"A Temporary Matter" has an ending that, though I didn't particularly like it, left an impact on me.  It was a horrible, horrible thing that this couple lost their child, but I didn't want them to get a divorce from this.  This tragic incident should have strengthened their relationship instead of weakened it, for "when the going gets tough get going."  But, as my mother works in a children's hospital where she deals with stories like this quite often, I have learned that these outcomes are quite common.  Thus, these things do happen in real life, so the somewhat ordinariness of this ending is what makes it relatable and memorable.  I have never dealt with this kind of situation, but I can easily see it happening.  In a way, this kind of ending scares me because of that, reminding me that reality is not perfect.

Okay, so this post is already over 1,500 words--that's more than five times what Louis asked for.  So I'm going to be quick:
Basically, I have stated all the qualities I like in an ending: cleverness, sadness, happiness, closure, relatability, a message of perseverance, and ordinary lives.  Not all together--trying to incorporate all of these qualities into one ending would be disastrous--but in separate stories.  It depends on the context.  I guess I am not so picky after all.

I think that I will write the ending to my own story that is ordinary, is relatable, and ties everything together.  I like endings that seem to solve a puzzle and connect all prior elements of the story, and so, to the best of my ability, I will try to do that.

Post #26: Cheating Is Wrong

The article "Cheating Upwards" begins with the story of Nayeem Ahsan and his incredible cheating scandal at Stuyvesant, an elite academy in lower Manhattan.  There are no thoughts, reflections, or even related facts stated by the author in the first one and a half pages; he just describes what happened this historic event, and so it reads like a short story.  However, at this point, the article shifts to listing and briefly describing related incidents of cheating, and as a result, the research that has been done to discover cheating statistics and why students cheat.  The author even throws in an experiment about what people think is acceptable to do without even realizing that it is cheating, and talks about the biological, psychological, and outside influences that make teenagers want to cheat.  In the last third of the article, the author shifts back to describing Nayeem Ahsan's cheating history up until this most recent scandal, and what will happen to him--and all the 140 others--now that he has been caught.

In "Cheating Upwards," Nayeem Ahsan is the main character, or the protagonist, and his cheating scandal is the rising action being caught by the principal and kicked out of school is the climax.  However, the passage about Nayeem's years of cheating leading up to the climax is also part of the rising action, and the discussion of what is to be done with him (in terms of where he will finish school), the other 140 students who were part of the cheating scandal, and the school itself is the resolution.  And everything in the middle--the related incidents of cheating, the research that has been done about why it happens, when cheating is acceptable vs. when it's not, biological/psychological/outside influences on students to cheat, etc.--is the falling action, the information we are learning that leads us up to the resolution.

I remembered a fair amount of the article before I read it--that Nayeem cheated, that he had cheated many times before, that he had been kicked out of school, etc.--but I had forgotten, or maybe had not even noticed, Nayeem's attitude toward all of this, even in the end.  I was shocked at how unwavering he was in his notion that his cheating has helped people, and he would do it all over again if he could, despite where it had gotten him.  I just don't understand that; I believe that, especially when it comes to academic work, people have to earn their own way.  They can be helped, and tutored, and tested endlessly, but when it comes to a test, or writing a paper, they can't have someone answering the questions and doing the work for them.  I understand that the teenagers who are more prone to cheating don't yet have fully developed brains like the adults who punish them do, that they prioritize the "thrill" of something over the morals it provides.  I understand that families, colleges, and other outside sources are pressuring their children to produce amazing pieces of work, and that said children are just trying to do what they can to live up to those expectations.  But, I stand by the decision I made back in May when I first read this article: cheating is still wrong.