The End is a post-apocalyptic musical about the family of an oil tycoon that live in a bunker in a salt mine. After 20 years of isolation the group accepts a new comer into their group disrupting the status quo.
The ensemble is all incredibly talented and bring those considerable gifts to bear. It's always a joy to see Tilda Swinton and Michael Shannon and they don't disappoint, the supporting cast Bronagh Gallagher, Tim McInnerny, and with less screentime Lennie James all really deliver. The 'kids' George MacKay and Moses Ingram are also adept. All of them, and its very much an ensemble piece, are able to navigate the bizarre stilted tone, the breaking into song, and the scenes of massive emotion with grace and an honesty that really work.
This is co-writer/director Joshua Oppenheimer's first feature and his first work in a decade(following 2014's doc The Look of Silence) and you can tell so much thought and effort went into this. It looks great, presumably mostly on sets with no CGI, it really evokes an actual place and feeling. The musical numbers, if too similar in melody and tempo, are effective, particularly a prolonged Michael Shannon dance sequence and a little tap dance interlude by McInnerny. Overall the production is rich and evocative and bodes well for Oppenheimer's future efforts in narrative film.
The film falls short in the third act and in its overall messaging. First of all it is too long, this glut of "serious" movies that have a 2 1/2 - 3 hour run time is absurd. Not that long runtimes are inherently bad but they have to have a purpose and the pacing needs to be amended accordingly. Here, like in many overlong movies, the film ends multiple times. The pacing drags and as a result interest is lost. There is no real need for it to be this long. The wonderful Shannon dance sequence referenced above very much feels like the end of the movie but then there's another anemic half an hour.
And then there's the messaging, similar to many of these end-of-year overlong serious movies, the message seems to be 'life is bleak' and 'the world is fucked', which 1. is boring, 2. is not entertaining, and 3. no shit. Not that movies with a depressing message can't be compelling but it seems like the industry says only these type of movies are cinema(just look at critics top 10 lists or awards nominations that are just now starting to percolate) and that is simply not true particularly in a time where these same industry people are saying 'movies are struggling'. Art(in this instance cinema) is about hope, it is about transformation, it is about inspiration. And The End is actually kind of on that track for 2/3 of its story, the characters contend with their pasts, their regrets, their culpability, and there seems to be some growth as a result. The work itself seems to be indicating this is the trajectory, this small enclave of what's left of society finally starts to be honest and, finally, begins to make some progress. But then they don't and you can clearly see Oppenheimer's will here, he goes against what the work itself wants to do and forces his embittered nihilistic worldview, a character dies, the rest of the characters compartmentalize and regress and its just feels very contrived dramatically and unsatisfying thematically. The film ultimately falls echoingly flat.
Ambitious, intriguing, haunting, but sour and in the end empty.
Currently in theaters, coming soon to VOD.
Rent It.
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