What ‘I’m Thinking of Ending Things’ is actually about

Photo courtesy of IndieWire

Warning: Spoilers Ahead

Content Warning: Suicide

“I’m Thinking of Ending Things” premiered in select theaters on Friday, Aug. 28, and came to Netflix on Friday, Sept. 4. It is an enticing film adaptation of the book written by Iain Reid, published June 14, 2016. For anyone who did not read the book, this movie was confusing to say the least. Here is a breakdown of what everything meant and what this movie was about.

On the surface, this film seems to just be about a road trip between a woman and her boyfriend, Jake. The only issue is that the woman, “Lucy,” is thinking of ending things with Jake. A lot of the movie is narrated by “Lucy,” and she keeps repeating the phrase, “I’m thinking of ending things.” Aside from this, nothing seems too strange until they arrive at Jake’s parents’ farmhouse. There are also random scene changes to an elderly janitor working at a high school. One confusing, weird thing happens after another for the rest of the movie, leaving viewers lost and confused.

The biggest plot point to grasp is that the janitor is Jake, but older. The moment that this is made relevant is when “Lucy” goes into the basement and opens the washing machine to find multiple janitor uniforms. The overarching theme of this movie is that everything is happening inside janitor Jake’s head. The concepts of aging, death and the passage of time are shown multiple times throughout the movie. First of all, “Lucy” can’t seem to remember when exactly she and Jake met and she talks about how she knows it’s only been a matter of weeks, but she feels like she’s known him for a really long time. When at his parents’ farmhouse, Jake tells her about the pigs that were eaten by maggots and had to be put down. 

There is also the obvious aging and reversal of aging of Jake’s parents. This could be interpreted as representing Jake’s own misconception of aging and where he, himself, is in time. He obviously imagines himself as much younger than he is, because during most of the movie he looks to be in his thirties. However, he is much older when shown as the janitor. In the very end of the movie, he is accepting some type of award and sings to an audience. Jake and the audience all have very disturbing makeup on to make them look older. It’s obvious that it is makeup and that everyone is much younger than they are meant to appear. This again, could represent Jake’s misconstrued view of age. 

Another important point to grasp is that “Lucy” is a figment of Jake’s imagination. This is why her name keeps changing: In the beginning it is “Lucy,” then it changes to “Louisa” and finally “Amy.” Her outfit and hairdo also shift slightly from scene to scene. Her occupation shifts between a student physicist, a poet and a painter. The story of how she and Jake met also changes a few times. The biggest clue to the fact that she is essentially a part of Jake’s mind are that she thinks the picture of him as a child is a picture of her as a child. Also, when she asks Jake to take her home, he thinks she means his parents’ farmhouse. As the movie progresses, she becomes more and more agitated, as she does not understand what is happening and a lot of things are not making sense to her. 

The ending of the movie shows elderly Jake taking all his clothes off inside his truck in the middle of a blizzard. A pig, partially eaten by maggots, appears and leads him back into the high school. Since the pig is obviously dead, it can be determined that he is also dead. This essentially symbolizes him killing himself, but it seems to have been done partially unknowingly and in a state of insanity. The woman (Lucy/Louisa/Amy) is the part of his brain saying, “I’m thinking of ending things,” as well as the part of his brain that is contemplating suicide.

This film is a brilliant, mind-twisting pot of symbolism, although the concept is incredibly hard to grasp. The entire film has an air of discomfort which is never resolved. While most people can get the general idea of what this movie is about, it is almost impossible to grasp the subtleties that make this film brilliant. However, that might just be the point; that the human brain is too complex to fully understand and grasp. “I’m Thinking of Ending Things” is an incredible film that everybody needs to watch and at least attempt to understand.