Rethinking the Happy Ending

An article in this past Sunday's NY Times strikes me as required reading for any screenwriter who has ever attempted to answer the question, "What does the audience want?"

Perfectly Happy Even Without Happy Endings, by Carrie Rickey, explores what Lindsay Doran (who produced  Sense and Sensibility and Stranger Than Fiction, among many other films) has learned from her extensive research on how movies work upon our emotions, and from the teachings of Dr. Martin Seligman, a "catalyst of the positive psychology movement" who has identified the five essential elements of well-being as: positive emotions, engagement, relationships, meaning, and accomplishment.  Analyzing hits and critical favorites, Doran confirmed what she'd intuitively suspected about what audiences responded to in movies that worked:

She broke down their emotional components, isolated the elements of mood elevation and tested her findings against those of market researchers. She concluded: Positive movies do not necessarily have happy endings; their characters’ personal relationships trump personal achievements; and male and female viewers differ in how they define a character’s accomplishments. Ms. Doran had long been drawn to “funny dramas and comedies that make you cry,” she said. Now she knew why.

You really ought to read the whole thing.  But here's the bit that I found most fascinating. Doran talked to a veteran market researcher who startled her by claiming that "audiences don't care about accomplishments" - apparent heresy in the face of standard Hollywood happy endings where girl gets boy, man kills shark, or king conquers stammer.  Said the vet:

“Audiences don’t care about an accomplishment unless it’s shared with someone else. What makes an audience happy is not the moment of victory but the moment afterwards when the winner shares that victory with someone they love.”

Doran found this to be true of one popular movie after another, and if you test it out, the idea becomes a "Duh!"  Sure, Shawshank Redemption's happy climax comes when Morgan Freeman is finally free, but the joy that earns tears and cheers from men and women alike arrives when Freeman's character reunites with Tim Robbins' and they get to celebrate their freedom together. 

Current hits as diverse as Globe-winners The Artist and The Descendants exhibit this principle in vivid relief; the same is true of Moneyball, The Help, and Bridesmaids.  Many a great movie has ended with relationship as the point, and an accomplishment never achieved (It's a Wonderful Life's George Bailey never does get to leave Bedford Falls).  In fact, a great many classic films have "happy" endings where someone beloved has died (Star Wars), and the shared joy carries an acknowledgment of something lost.

Doran's idea also dovetails with one of my own long-held convictions about romantic comedy endings - that the best and most resonant are "joyful defeats" - boy-gets-girl moments leavened with a sense of loss (e.g. Shakespeare in Love, which leaves its lovers separated, though eternally "together").  You can see it at work in one of my favorite rom-com climaxes, that of Lindsay Doran's own Sense and Sensibility (while online restrictions nixed embedding it here, you can view the scene via this Hulu link).  When Elinor (Emma Thompson) learns that Edward (Hugh Grant) is free to marry her (happiness!) she totally loses it, uncontrollably weeping (sad but hilarious); what's lost is her pride and long-practiced composure.

But the best bit follows as we cut to her mother and two sisters, who've hurried outside to give the couple their privacy.  Little Sister climbs a ladder to peek in the window, and excitedly reports to Mom and Big Sis that Edward has gone down on one knee.  It's a shrewd and inventive way to depict an otherwise cliched moment (i.e. the obligatory proposal is off-screen) but it also gives us Doran's emotional catharsis: As the women laugh, cry, and hug, relationship is celebrated.  The couple's happiness is shared - and continues, as we cut to a wedding with a smiling, publicly coupled Elinor and Edward in attendance.

Here's a fun and educational game to play: Check out some of your favorite movies' endings, and see if what Doran and her Dr. Seligman are talking about proves true.  Then you might want to reexamine the last pages of your own project-in-progress.  Happy?  Sad?  Something that's working, evidently, is a combination of the two.

Comments

[E.C. Henry]

Reading your latest post, Billy, harkens me back to the ending of "My Big Fat Greek Wedding" where Toula (Nia Vardalos) FINALLY gets her happy ending alone with her husband Ian Miller (John Corbett) as they're walk past her mother and father's house hand-in-hand, as they walk their daughter to school. It's a happy ending from Toula's point of view: she's now spending time with the man she loves, their relationship has yeilded some fruit, and she's come to peace with how their union with co-exist with her family -- which is the central question posed in this story.

Love a good "happy ending," and you're right; sharing that with other people makes it more memorable, rich, and rewarding.

- E.C. Henry from Bonney Lake, WA

[Scott]

One word: "Adrian!!"

A few more words: REAL STEEL (produced by Steven Spielberg). 1) It's a better film than you'd think. 2) Before the typical ending where the main characters are celebrating a victory, the love story between Hugh Jackman and his estranged son really peaks (spoiler) when the witnesses his father step into a fighting role he had been resisting. The awesome moment comes when Hugh's love interest (and future co-parent?) *watches* the son *watch* the father gloriously battle for all of them.

It was completely manipulative and I was there every step of the way. Okay, I was watching with my 10 year-old son, but steel. I mean still...

[mernitman]

EC: Your MBFGW analysis sounds spot-on to me.

Scott: Haven't seen RS but that sounds like the "celebrating relationship" idea cubed! Neat.

[Zach]

Jaws should have ended with an illustration of Sheriff Brody's acceptance into Amity island! The smiles, the cheers, the hugs!

[Christina]

This explains why my mother was so upset by the ending of UP IN THE AIR, when he ends up TOTALLY alone. She turned the DVD player off and said, "I hated it!" She'd like it up until the end. You know they could have added one more beat. After he picks where he's going to go, he could get on the plane, sit down next to an age-appropriate gal without a wedding ring, smile and say 'Hi' - give him the hope that the next time out he's gonna get it right.

[Ourdia]

Billy, Great post. Would love to get my hand on the NYT's article. Any chance you will post a link to it? Thanks

[Judith Duncan]

Billy,the article about Linsay Doran is great.
When reading it I was reminded of the ending of Field of Dreams which brings me to tears every time. After everything he has done,he doesn't get to go into the corn fields and he's standing there saying 'What about me?'He turns around and his father is there as a young man and they get to play ball.
Choking up as I write.

Cheers,
Judith

[mernitman]

Zach: LOL.

Christina: You're right. I got flack for the "he's alone and okay with it" ending in my own first novel... in the screenplay adaptation there's the inkling of something (someone) new, instead...

Ourdia: You got it.

Judith: Faucets! Totally.

[Christina]

Billy, I had an epiphany today after reading your comment. I thought the ending of your novel was true to the story and thought it worked. I also liked UP IN THE AIR regardless of the downer ending. I suspect, however, I may have a "French" heart, lol. Because I even liked the ending of UN COEUR EN HIVER which if you've seen it is one of the most emotionally brutal endings EVER. I suspect in a similar manner that one of the problems with YOUNG ADULT is it suffered from its French ending, i.e., the character continues living on - deluded, unchanged and alone.

All this said, yes - absolutely bring in the hint of new love interest to your adaptation. :-)

[christian comedian]

I never enjoy movies that do not have a happy ending. Such movies never really complete in my mind. I would love to watch comedy that gives me something to look forward to in the end.