What’s your favourite
happy ending?
In literature and movies, happy endings tend to get a bad rap. Rather than celebrated as expressions of optimism and the moments of joy found frequently over the course of most lives, they are instead criticized as contrived and unrealistic–often tediously so. More often than not works with a darker and more depressing conclusion are held up to higher critical esteem, while those with more conventionally positive outcomes are regarded as more frivolously populist entertainments.
It’s a sentiment I’ve always found perplexing–the idea that hope is less realistic than despair–and though many of my favourite works have negative outcomes, I’ve never felt that this gave them a verisimilitude that other films lack. More often than not a unhappy ending is just a way to buck convention and be different and–as many DVD deleted scenes prove–aren’t any more true to life than the alternative.
So, in the name of giving happy endings their due, let’s talk about the ones we love the most and feel exactly right. Here are several of mine, chosen from a much larger list. Be warned, there will be spoilers.
1) The Ghost and Mrs. Muir – A lonely widow dies of old age, finally able to spend the rest of eternity with the phantom she’s loved for decades.
2) Kill Bill V.2 – The mama lion is reunited with her cub and all is right with the world.
3) Field of Dreams – A father and son play catch as the lights from the road give the effort meaning.
4) The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters – Steve Wiebe breaks Billy Mitchell’s record and for once stands on top, even if the battle will carry on.
5) Rushmore – The friends, family and acquaintances of Max Fischer celebrate his latest masterpiece and dance.
6) Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory – Charlie Bucket does the right thing and wins it all.
The ending of my favourite film – “Dark City”.
“Kill Bill” was a good one; ditto “Charlie & the Chocolate Factory.”
I like happy endings ONLY when they fit; sometimes they seem pasted-on and fake. (“Breakfast at Tiffany’s,” I’m talking to you.)
A couple of my favorites are “Night of the Comet” and “Penelope,” the latter of which I just recently saw.
I LOVE THE ENDING OF NIGHT OF THE COMET! Although everyone else in the world is still dead. 🙂 And which PENELOPE–Christina Ricci with a pig nose or Natalie Wood as a gorgeous kleptomaniac?
Christina Ricci’s “Penelope.”
And in regards to “Night of the Comet,” I’m mostly okay with the drastic population reduction.
Charade.
It’s the BEST written happy ending, with Cary Grant totally making her think he’s married, TWICE, before revealing that he’s not, but that he’d like to marry her.
Maximum swoonage.
Heart and Soul is one of my favorite endings.
Sense and Sensibility! After a parlor scene filed with delightful misunderstanding, it turns out Edward isn’t married after all! He proposes to Elinor, and then the film ends with Marianne’s wedding to Prof. Snape!