Movie Endings

Just saw the ending of one of my favortie movies: Practical Magic where Sandra Bullock (my girl crush) and Nicole Kidman are sisters who are witches. It's just a fun, girl's movie with a very strong feminist slant. Anyway, at the end, Sandra and this cop have fallen in love and she is narrating the ending. Then she says, "These things I know for certain: Always throw spilled salt over your left shoulder; keep Rosemary by your garden gate; plant lavendar for luck; and fall in love whenever you can." I love that part, and just watched it again on YouTube.

I also love Aiden Quinn in this movie who plays a cop who is investigating Sandra for murder but they fall in love.

My other two favorite endings are Glory -- about the African-American regiment in the Civil War, led by Matthew Broderick and their struggle for respect. At the end, they volunteer for this suicide mission and there is a journalist from Harper's who has been traveling with them. Matthew Broderick says to the journalist, "If I should fall, remember what you saw here." Meaning record how brave these men are. Of course, he is killed and tossed into a mass grave with his men (some of whom do succeed in breaking into this Confederate fort). Starring Denzel Washington and Morgan Freeman too.

 

 

When Glory came out in 1989, I saw a segment on 20/20 or 60 minutes about how the film makers recruited homeless black men to be the extras. At first, these guys were all smokin' and jokin' and then they taught them how to precision march and it totally changed them and you saw this pride in themselves. I always wondered if any of those men were changed permanently by the experience.

And speaking of Morgan, how can you not love the ending of Shawshank Redemption? I've seen that movie 20 times and I don't watch it when I come upon it flipping around the channels, but I will make note of the time and go back and watch that beautiful ending. Hope is a good thing.