The Simple Explanations Behind The Most Ambiguous Movie Endings Of All Time

By the time it is finally revealed at the end of Shutter Island that Teddy is actually Andrew, it turns out he is to be lobotomized after taking a deep dive back into insanity. He says "This place makes me wonder which would be worse: to live as a monster, or to end as a good man?"

Most people assume this is simply the ramblings of a mad man who is about to suffer a horrific operation. However, the true meaning could well be that Andrew is faking his illness in order to escape the crushing guilt from the things he has committed. Having been cured of his madness, he is able to comprehend what he has done and chooses to have a lobotomy in order to dull this guilt forever.

Although Arrival was lauded by critics, it left some viewers confused over what the end of the story actually meant. The conclusion reveals that the flashbacks Louise has been seeing throughout the movie are actually not glimpses of the past, but rather visions of the future.

The character is seeing her unborn daughter, Hannah, will develop the terrible illness and eventually pass. Louise then chooses to embrace her future and go through the events that she has foreseen, even knowing the tragedy that will befall her—and Ian, Hannah's father.

Stanley Kubrick garnered a reputation for purposely including elements at the end of his movies that would confuse the audience. This is best demonstrated with The Shining, which shows a photo of the recently-passed Jack Torrance in a staff photograph at the hotel in the year 1921 - 60 years before the events of the movie.

The question of what exactly this means in the context of the rest of the movie has baffled people for decades. After all, Jack looks exactly the same age, and the time difference is too great to account for the similar appearance. The ending was meant to signify that Jack is the reincarnation of a past guest or staff member of the Overlook Hotel in 1921. 

Others argue the photo signifies everyone the hotel has "taken" over the years. When Jack dies, his soul is transported to the photo. The reincarnation theory came straight from Kubrick himself, but some people still hold onto this potential theory.

The last act of American Psycho reveals everything is not exactly as it may have appeared throughout the movie. Patrick Bateman gets himself into an impossible situation but somehow manages to escape from several police officers by taking out their squad car. The night ends with him confessing to all of the crimes and agreeing to meet his lawyer the next day.

However, soon comes a revelation that one of the supposed victims is still alive, leaving Bateman in utter bafflement as to what has actually happened. This leads to the conclusion that all of these events seemed unreal because they were; rather, Bateman's visions of the incidents were just the fantasies of a sick mind imagining horrific issues.

There has been a huge amount of controversy surrounding the question of whether Rick Deckard is a replicant. Although most people don’t think this is definitively answered in the film, director Ridley Scott believes he made it perfectly clear the Blade Runner protagonist is an android rather than a human.

The final moments of the movie show Deckard running away with Rachael and finding an origami unicorn left by Eduardo Gaff. He had previously dreamed of a unicorn earlier in the movie. This is something Gaff would only know if he had seen implanted dreams in Deckard’s memory.

The very last scene of Birdman sees the main character, Riggan Thomson, climb out an open window. His daughter walks in moments later and eventually looks up to the sky smiling, suggesting that Riggan was able to fly up into the sky just like his alter ego.

However, this may not be what actually happens, as all the other magical elements from the movie have a serious element of doubt in them. The actions Riggan believes he is doing can always be explained without him having any magical abilities. Meanwhile, the daughter has the same mental issues as her father, meaning she could easily have imagined Riggan was flying away rather than plunging to his final fate.