![]() ![]() While Reid’s novel makes it explicitly clear that “Lucy” is not real, Kaufman made the gamble of giving her agency. This would imply that the janitor’s truck was left in the parking lot after he ended his life over the school’s Thanksgiving break. We see the janitor’s truck covered in snow, and eventually hear the sounds of an approaching vehicle and snow being scraped. At the end of the film, Jake’s car disappears from the school parking lot, leaving only the janitor’s truck. Based on Jake’s morbid conversations with his girlfriend, he seems to be contemplating suicide due to his depression. This older man is now reflecting on the mistakes of his youth as he contemplates the end of his life. To take things one step further, Jake is actually the same elderly janitor that we see interspersed throughout the story. Jake is trying to imagine what his perfect life with this girl (whose name keeps changing because he can’t decide on one) would look like he’s unsure when he wants to introduce her to his parents, which explains why they keep changing ages. While the real Jake never actually approached this young woman, the film is an extension of a fantasy in which he did. As Jake reveals in his conversation with his parents, he considered approaching a girl at a trivia night event and asking her out. While I'm Thinking of Ending Things is told from Lucy's perspective, she is simply a Tyler Durden-esque extension of Jake. While Reid’s novel is more explicit in its twist ending, the interviews that Kaufman and the film’s cast have given following its 2020 Netflix release suggest that it’s not quite as clear. I’m Thinking of Ending Things can be overwhelming on a first watch there are overt references and allusions to A Beautiful Mind, A Woman Under The Influence, Oklahoma!, the works of William Wordsmith, the film criticism of Pauline Kael, and even “Baby, It’s Cold Outside.” However, the only piece of literature you really need to understand the film’s message is Reid’s original novel. Simultaneously, footage is intercut with an elderly janitor that is cleaning up a school. The evening gets even more bizarre when Jake’s mother ( Toni Collette) and father ( David Thewlis) begin changing forms and starting erratic conversations. Their conversations begin to feel morbid when the Lucy recites a disturbing poem about her sense of depression. Is she thinking of ending the relationship, or ending, you know, things? We shall see.I’m Thinking of Ending Things follows the young man Jake ( Jesse Plemons) and his girlfriend Lucy ( Jessie Buckley) as they take a road trip to see his parents over Thanksgiving. There’s an almost Woody Allen-esque vibe at first, with Lucy saying in voice-over, “I’m thinking of ending things,” while the oblivious Jake prattles on in a monotone about his love for musicals, rattling title after title off. With “I’m Thinking of Ending Things,” Kaufman is directing and adapting the acclaimed 2016 novel of the same name by Iain Reid, and he does a brilliant job of remaining faithful to the book while adding his own unique spin(s).įor a long and riveting opening stretch, we’re in the car with Buckley’s Lucy and Plemons’ Jake as they drive in wintry weather to visit Jake’s parents on the farm where he grew up. It’s been some 20 years since Charlie Kaufman exploded on the scene as the screenwriter of films such as “Being John Malkovich,” “Adaptation” and “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.” Kaufman’s work became ever more surreal and existential as he wrote and directed “Synedoche, New York” (2008) and the stop-motion animated “Anomalisa” (2015). ![]()
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