I'm Thinking of Ending Things Review + Analysis - YMS

0:00 review
2:28 spoiler analysis

[SeTHeMouse]

Jake hated himself so much that he couldn't even tell his own story through his perspective.

[stanko]

Also, the Dad never looks at Jake.
...
they LITERALLY never see eye to eye.

[BetterThenNormal]

The part that haunts me the most is how the father couldn't understand the emotion of looking at a landscape if there is no person in the image to show that feeling. And the movie ends with a snow covered car with the janitor presumably inside where we can't see him or how he felt. Seems like a comment on how so many people must have seen the janitor but had no idea the deep depressed feelings and thoughts within him.

[JacksToWin]

The choice of ice cream as a such an important symbol seemed weird to me at first but I think the reasoning behind it is to show that he's been having this same fantasy for months. At first going out for ice cream was a fun way to spend a summer afternoon but as the months went on and the weather got worse the same fantasy feels sad and uncomfortable. It's clear by the end of the film that the fantasy no longer does its job of keeping away the suicidal thoughts and the out of place ice cream trip shows that.

[hyenaguy]

I can't believe Adam would like this film when it has snow and a pig walking, proving it is indeed a ripoff of Kimba the White Lion.

[lutek]

I notice he so often interupts her talking. He already knows what she is saying anyway since they are his own thoughts.

[jodrabls]

I think the last image in the film is about what Jake's father said about not feeling anything about a picture if you can't see another person feeling anything on the canvas. In the last shot, you know there is an old man sitting dead and full of regret inside the snow-covered car. You feel sad, even though you can't see a sad person there.

[fibbles]

Another interesting note to note: The constant whistling and interruption of the winter's wind is a manifestation of Jake's tinnitus, which we're told about through the mother. At least that was my interpretation of it ;p

[Wordofboredom]

Whats the saddest part for me is that jake is soo well read and seems smart but since he has no one to interact with and share his love of art and movies with, he himself starts to believe he's somehow pretentious for liking this stuff and that's evident with the girl react to his interests sometimes. Like he's even starting to hate the things he love and can't even convince his own brain otherwise. I myself for some time thought like just constantly consuming great art can be a reason to live but apparently not.

[ailsapeacock]

The book Ice by Anna Kavan that’s in his bedroom is a hallucinatory novel in which the protagonist chases his dream girl around the world as an icy apocalypse descends. At the end they die of hypothermia while driving into a blizzard.

[someguystudios]

When you say that the female lead having multiple professions is the janitor testing different scenarios, I think that it has more to do with her being all the things the janitor never became. We can see this through the mom character talking about how much of a great artist Jake is and how his childhood paintings are the same paintings the the female lead made. This is also what I think the nobel prize represents. He won a Nobel Prize because in his fantasy he became all the things the female lead was.

[MsMegadude]

Hello, Adum! I was one of the audience member extras in the ending sequence. Jesse Plemmons' speech and "musical number" was a mesmerizing and surreal performance to see in real life and I am glad it translated so well to the screen. The fact this film resonates so much with you inspires me to continue doing what I do for a living.
Thank you so much for sharing your thoughts and analysis on this movie. Glad I was able to be just a small part in what made this film so foreboding yet so mesmerizing.

[drakejohnson]

The janitor never leaved his truck at the end. Throughout the final scene with Jake onstage, if you listen closely you can clearly hear the cold wind of the blizzard roaring in the background. Even the Netflix subtitles take note of this, describing it as "wind crackling".

[brondermody]

When depression hits you hard enough you begin to see yourself as a stranger - Jake can no longer relate to himself in any sense and see's himself from an outsider perspective, where it is easier to constantly criticise and more difficult to see the subtle reasons and good things he does. A sort of disassociation in a way.

[alara]

I really suggest everyone reads the book. The book is also based on the concept that you have to reread it (or at least certain parts) to understand the story completely, and because in novels everything is written out it's easier to understand. If you used to read a lot when you were younger and now feel like you've fallen out of that habit this is the perfect novel to bring back your love of reading.
(Minor spoilers for the book)
Literally on the first page it says "Maybe the end was written from the beginning." I'm so happy the author got Kaufman to adapt this.

[KikeRorschach]

A thing I noticed and loved is that the car scenes have no direction in movement, they only move foward in a straight line, even after leaving the farm there's no indication that they are going back, since the road was never clear enough for us to now where they were. The only scenes where the direction changes is when they arrive to the farm, the ice cream shop and the school, if they were moving back, why did the school or especially the ice cream shop never appeared before? This relates to the idea that times moves only foward, in this case so does space.

[casualromp]

As someone who is a janitor, who has studied in the arts and suffers from depression, this film struke all the chords.

After only one watch, it wasn’t until the end of the movie that I think I truly understood it. This is one of the rarest films out there that I find very relatable and that’s what saddens me.

Im only 28 and I felt all the pain that this poor old soul was going through. From what I remember, back in high school we almost did Oklahoma my senior year. And as much as I would’ve loved to be Curly, I know deep down that I was Judd.

I’m sitting in my car right now, in a parking lot, writing this comment while scrolling through my whole life in my head. Not to sound poetic or anything, but at this very moment, I don’t know what to do next. There’s a lump in my throat and I’m tearing up and I just feel so small. I’m sorry I got too personal. I really only came here to say I agree with everything Adam said.

Overall, I just wanted to point out this was a perfect analysis of the movie and if you’re on the fence about it, I highly recommend it.

[crpalstuck]

INB4 Adam makes a five part analysis series on this film that never fully completes

[fourteenthnumber]

Other interesting thing was that when Jake and Jesse talks about the song Baby It's Cold Outside, it's like Jake holding onto Jesse and through Jesse's commentary on how the song is creepy, he's again feeling guilty and seeing himself as a creep. Like he's somewhat educated to know these issues and be self-aware which only resulted in self-hatred other than anything fruitful he yearned

[BlueTrueBlueClue]

One small detail I’d like to add is that the film is in a 4:3 aspect ratio. 4:3 was the default aspect of television shows for most of TV history, and not only does the tight frame make for a heightened sense of anxiety, I think it ties into the themes of The Janitor watching his own story, as well as how the media we consume affects our versions of ourselves. We create our own realities based on the realities we perceive.

In fact, in a sense, I think that is what the greater metaphor of the film is... We are all The Janitor. We are all these sad, lonely creatures experiencing the harsh, cold realities of time. We are all getting older. We will all die alone in some sense. And we will kill our memories and our potential realities. We will all have our regrets and humiliations and misfortunes. And in our moments of bad luck, we are all the pig infested with maggots.

Think upon many moments: The girl looks right into the camera at points. The narration is directed at us. The nearly illegible opening titles. The early credits “Directed by Robert Zemeckis.” The film is very clearly making a point that it is a film. It’s drawing attention to its form. Why? Because it wants you to think about how the story relates to you.

If there was someone watching your life right now, what would your story be? Would you, the narrator, look the viewer in the eye? Would you be proud of how it unfolds and ends?