The best horror films not only try to sink their hooks into you during the entire three acts of their runtime, but they also go for a wallop of an ending, so you’re stunned as you turn off the TV or walk out of the theater. For example,Smile 2was one of 2024’s best horror films, but as scary as it was,it’s that final image which stays with us the most. One of horror’s most messed up, shocking finales goes toMartyrs, a 2008 French film, witha last scene that’ll make your jaw drop as it sends a chill down your spine. Neither of these more modern examples can compare with 1973’sDon’t Look Now, starringDonald SutherlandandJulie Christie. This Nicolas Roeg film is a haunting story about loss, all building to an ending that will make you jump out of your seat and leave you feeling utterly hopeless.
‘Don’t Look Now’ Is a Slowburn Horror Film About Grief
Don’t Look Now, written byAllan ScottandChris Bryant, is based on a short story byDaphne du Maurier. The film, released in 1973, came out on the precipice of change for the horror genre, asthe next year would see the likes ofThe Texas Chain Saw MassacreandBlack Christmascome out, leading to the slasher wave a few years later. WhileDon’t Look Nowdoes have a slasher of an ending, its horror is instead found mostly in the pain of loss.
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How do I jump out of this thing?
The film centers on the drowning of John and Laura Baxter’s (Sutherland and Christie) young daughter, Christine (Sharon Williams). The aftermath, as we’re pulled into their all-encompassing grief, is terrifying enough, butDon’t Look Nowhas more going on. After the Baxters try to escape their grief by moving to Venice,John is besieged by sightings of a short, unseen person wearing a red coat just like the one his daughter died in. Could she have somehow returned from the dead? He also begins to have visions that show his wife at a funeral which he can’t make sense of.The audience can’t make sense of it either until the horrifying finale.
The Last Minute of ‘Don’t Look’ Now Has Horror’s Biggest Scare
Don’t Look Now’s ending is arguably not the film’s most famous moment. Instead, it’s an earlier sex scene involving the Baxters which has become highly talked about over the decades because Donald Sutherland and Julie Christie were reportedly having real intercourse during the scene.While both actors have denied this claim, it still lives on, and has drawn in many viewers who only want to watch out of curiosity. If that’s what brings you toDon’t Look Now, so be it, but when the final credits roll, it’s another scene you’ll remember most.
At the end ofDon’t Look Now, John Baxter sees the short figure in red again walking at night and corners them. They stand against a wall, turned away from us, but John tells them it’s okay, he won’t hurt them. When they turn around,John does not stare into the eyes of his dead daughter, but an old woman with dwarfism(Adelina Poerino). The empty smile on her face as she shakes her head repeatedly and doesn’t say a word is terrifying. The woman then pulls out a knife and slashes John to death.What had been a mysterious film about grief suddenly becomes so in your face that you don’t want to look now.
The Ending of ‘Don’t Look Now’ Is as Hopeless as It Gets
As the shock of the moment settles in,what the viewer is left with at the end ofDon’t Look Nowis the utter futility of everything. We have spent so much time with John that we genuinely care about him. He is a man truly trying to find a way to live after his daughter’s death and not give up,and we see how much he still loves his wife. He won’t let his daughter’s memory go, and he won’t stop moving. In another movie, we imagine that maybe he would be strong enough to find a way to live with the pain of his child’s loss without letting it consume and destroy him. When the woman in red turns and smiles at John, we want him to run for his life because he has been fighting for it.
Instead, he’s killed, even as those who care about him have visions warning him of the danger and are trying to stop him. Their visions weren’t able to help John in time, but even more heartbreaking is the realization of what John’s visions were about.He has been seeing his own death this whole time. This means that there was never a way out. No matter what he did to survive, no matter how driven he was to find the figure in red, nothing mattered. He was always going to die.Don’t Look Nowtakes its hero from us, and tells us he was going to die from the beginning. You can’t get more bleak than this, and that is where the true horror lies.
Don’t Look Nowis available to watch on Pluto TV.
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Don’t Look Now
