comment #1

Jeremy Smith says ...

Then stop talking about it, David.

comment #2

jeffmcm says ...

Exactly. To explain it would diminish it. Tony Soprano is in TV limbo forever and that's the way David Chase wants it, without pandering to the catharsis junkies.

comment #3

thorsen1nk says ...

And Rick Deckard is really a replicant! Oh, wait, wrong thread....

comment #4

BurmaShave says ...

Catharsis Junkies, I like that. Someone should definetly start a band called that.

On an unrelated note, did anyone else think that was Rutger Hauer in the SLIPSTREAM banner ad?

comment #5

BurmaShave says ...

Dear god, thorsen made it a related note. Creepy.

comment #6

Mgmax, le Corbeau says ...

"Whether it happened that night or some other night doesn't really matter."

Bingo, I win.

comment #7

Craig Kennedy says ...

There are no winners here Mgmax. This one will never be put to bed.

comment #8

KeithNYC says ...

Jeff,
Thanks for posting this. Yes, Tony is obviously dead. Chase is vague early on but he gives it up later with the Torciano reference

Notice Chase said there are no "esoteric" clues BUT that we should be looking at the final episode AND episode before that one and that one and so on. Why would we do that if Tony lived? There is no answer to find as Tony is alive the last time we see him.

The Torciano murder/Tony murder parallel's are eerie. The Torciano murder has the POV of a witness at the table. Sil does not hear the shots until after it is over. The audio cuts off in the scene. Tony's murder has the victims POV (Tony) at the moment of death. Chase does this b/c every time the bell rings, Tony looks up and we cut to Tony's POV. The 5th and last time the bell rings (for Meadow), Tony looks up and we cut to the "Blackness" signifying that Tony is dead and he sees and hears "nothing". Tony and "us" never heard it coming. Just like Silvio in the Torciano hit. In fact, Sil later tells Tony about the Torciano hit and says "Wierd thing was I did not know what happened until AFTER the shots were fired". JUST like the viewers experience with Tony's murder. Sil's words also echo Bacala's words. Chase was setting us up the whole time. Also, the follow up scene where Sil tells Tony "I did not know what happened until after the shot was fired, wierd" has no practical significance. The viewer SAW the scene, we KNEW Sil did not hear it until it was over. The extra scene is superflous UNLESS Chase wants to hammer a point home that will pay off LATER ON, namely Tony's death experience.

The exact nature of Tony's death as explained earlier would be identical to Bacala's words and Sil's experience. By putting us in Tony's POV in the last shot we KNOW that he didnt hear it coming

Also, look at Phil murder. He probably didnt hear it coming. His wife also has the "delayed" reaction and does not start screaming until Phil is on the floor. Not to mention other obvious parallels (both murdered in front of family of 3 including wife).

So there is a clear pattern of "never hearing it coming" including characters making explicit references to it TO Tony himself. Chase clearly wanted to get this concept across. So, Chase by putting us in Tony's eyes in the last shot, Tony and "us" never hear it coming.

Like I said, Chase gives it up. The definite "Tony dead" interpretation is there. If you need more, read this:

http://thechaselounge.net/showthread.php?t=2204

Also:
The Tony "looking over his shoulder" theory just does not work and is not there if you carefully look at the scene
(1) Only ONE patron does Chase really pay attention to, that is "Man in Members Only Jacket"
(2)Members Only Guy is the ONLY patron shown looking at Tony
(3)There are numerous shots of patrons clearly NOT a threat to Tony (young laughing couple, cub scouts)
(4) Tony is NEVER nervous in the scene. He is happy. Of course he looks up when the bell rings, he is EXPECTING his family.
(5)The bell sequence was crafted by Chase to establish Tony's POV in the final shot (blackness).
(6) Chase in the interview said the original idea was "Tony is with his family and a guy walks in". This indicates ONE threat. Not numerous threats symbolyzing Tony's paranoia.
(7) The biggest reason of all and something all the critics missed. We have known since episode 1 that Tony always has to look over his shoulder. He is a mafia boss. It makes no sense that THIS would be Chase's FINAL big point on the series. No way. He took 2 years off to craft this ending. The Torciano reference shows Chase crafted the ending early in the narrative to pay off later on and to provide clarity for the final scene.

Once again, for more clarity:
http://thechaselounge.net/showthread.php?t=2204

comment #9

transmogrifier says ...

It's clear Tony is dead. And it's also clear that Chase doesn't have the guts or grace to just let the argument simmer, but has to step on board and tell us what really happened. If it was so important for us to know, you should have made it clearer in the episode itself.

And I think his criticism of the fans is a bit rich; they were after closure, not necessarily Tony being whacked. He's knows this, I think, but is trying to drum up some controversy to compensate for having no show any more.

comment #10

T. Holly says ...

Great interview by Brett Martin, I just wish he tied it together with the narrative break of Tony eyeing the restaurant to Tony seeing himself seated, looking back at himself. Maybe Tony's not looking for Tony's blood.

comment #11

KeithNYC says ...

Forgot to mention, in case anybody forgot. Bacalas's words are "You probably never hear it when it happens, right?". Chase flashes back to it at the end of the penultimate episode.

Lke I said, the significance of this is now corraborated by Silvio's experience and possibly the exact nature of Tony's death.

The "catharsis junkies" stuff is nonsense and an argument made by people who choose to not want to understand the ending. Chase words suggest that Tony's death was something carefully constructed by Chase early on in the narrative of the final season. There is no "catharsis". Tony's death will always be a mystery as to who exactly did it and why.

Chase just chose to kill Tony in a unique way that has never been seen before. Like he said he had NO interest in the IMAGE of Tony's death b/c the fans were hypocrites. So, he puts those same fans (whom he calls pathetic) in Tony's eyes at the moment of death. Notice he calls these fans Tony's "alter ego". We would NOT be removed from Tony's death b/c we cheered for him all along. So we get to experience the same jarring, disorienting feeling of sudden death.

It makes perfect sense as Members Only Jacket Man is a little behind Tony and in a clear field of sight outside the bathroom. This sets up Tony never seeing or hearing it coming.

Chase, being vague early on is him just trying to keep the cachet of an ambiguous ending going. Later on in the interview he spills the beans.

comment #12

Mgmax, le Corbeau says ...

"Yes, Tony is obviously dead."

David Chase will sure appreciate your correcting his mistake, then!

comment #13

KeithNYC says ...

"It's clear Tony is dead. And it's also clear that Chase doesn't have the guts or grace to just let the argument simmer, but has to step on board and tell us what really happened. If it was so important for us to know, you should have made it clearer in the episode itself."

I disagree with this. In fact, Chase seems to want to keep it ambiguous with his "it could have happened that night or some other night" line. Which, as we see later in the interview is contradictory to his later words which suggest the definite Tony dies interpretation. I think Chase is wrestling with 2 things. One, he wants to keep the "cachet" of his open ending going and (2) he wants people to realize how he carefully constructed Tony's death in the narrative. He wants to have it both ways. His first comment is basically saying "you are all right about the ending, its anyway you want it", his later comment about the Torciano scene says "Enough already, dont you people get it, I made it obvious, Tony is dead!!".

comment #14

Mgmax, le Corbeau says ...

As I said many times when we went over and over this, just because you see something in this episode and go "Aha!", don't think that Chase isn't standing there going "Gotcha!" Nothing is proof that X happened-- as he now confirms. It's all an indication that Tony's life is like this from now on-- today could be the day, this could be the guy. Or not.

But in any case, the real point of the episode was never the end. It's about how fleeting life is-- a gangster who could be whacked at any moment is ultimately no different from any of us. The setting is one of the last times they'll eat together as a family before the kids go on to their own lives. He visited the last survivor of the preceding generation, who no longer remembers who he is. He's alone. We all are. The dark figure in the Members Only jacket will come for all of us soon enough and tell us, the club of Life? Members only, pal. You're outta here. Trying to decide how the plot turned out is missing the point by a mile.

comment #15

X-Texan says ...

All this thread needs is for someone to point out how the head moves "back, and to the left. Back, and to the left."

comment #16

PhilVillarreal says ...

The blackout doesn't mean death, given the source. On "The Sopranos" and almost every other HBO drama, a lead character getting "killed" correlates with staying dead no more than half the time. Think Peter Krause in "Six Feet Under," Swerengen in "Deadwood," the female cop in "The Wire," the surfer kid in one of the early episodes of "John from Cincinnati" and Tony and Christopher earlier on in "The Sopranos." Apparent death in HBO shows is no more permanent than it is in comic books when Supermen or She-Hulks bite it hard.

comment #17

KeithNYC says ...

"As I said many times when we went over and over this, just because you see something in this episode and go "Aha!", don't think that Chase isn't standing there going "Gotcha!"

Actually no. Chase cites a SPECIFIC scene and goes into DETAIL on how this suggests Tony's death in the end. Some much so that Mr.Martin interrupts Chase to ask the next, logical follow up question "Are you saying...(Tony's dead)?. Chase then backtracks and says "to explain it would be to diminish it" (i.e. "I dont want to explicitly say it because I want you to use your brains to figure it out!).

Chase has now indicated that he specifically constructed a scene to give us clarity on the ultimate scene and Tony's final fate.

That is why Jeff posted this.

The Torciano scene is something that has speculated as a clue to Tony's death for months.

Chase just confirmed it. He is saying the Tony is dead interpretation IS there and was intentional.

He also said earlier in the interview, "It" could happen "that night" or "some other night". "It" suggests some sort of definite sudden end for Tony. So if you dont want Tony to die that night you can take comfort in that BUT he will meet a sudden pre-mature end.

comment #18

Mgmax, le Corbeau says ...

If you want to believe that, fine, but he plainly says there's not meant to be a definitive answer-- and I still think even seeking one is missing the real point of the last episode.

comment #19

Jay T. says ...

Anyone who makes an absolute statement about the ending of that show completely missed the point of the whole show. Do people still not realize this?

comment #20

ajphux says ...

This isn't a comment, it's for Jeff. I saw this today on Reuters. What's your take?

Director De Palma disturbed over Iraq film edit
Fri Oct 19, 2007 9:01 AM EDT

By Christine Kearney

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Veteran Hollywood director Brian De Palma has lashed out at what he calls the censorship of his new film about Iraq and the chilling effect of corporate America on the war.

De Palma's film, "Redacted," is based on the true story of a group of U.S. soldiers who raped and killed a 14-year-old Iraqi girl and murdered members of her family. It has stunned audiences for its shocking images and rattled American conservative commentators before its U.S. opening next month.

But De Palma says he is upset that the documentary-style drama -- its name derived from his view that news coverage of the war has been incomplete -- has been censored.

The film's distributor, Magnolia Pictures, ordered the faces of dead Iraqis shown in a montage of photographs at the end of the film be blacked out.

"I find it remarkable. 'Redacted' got redacted. I mean, how ironic," De Palma, who made his name directing violent films like "Scarface" and "The Untouchables," said in an interview. "I fought every way I could in order to stop those photographs from being redacted and I still lost."

De Palma has loudly argued the issue in public, including sparring with Eamonn Bowles, the president of Magnolia, during a recent forum at the New York Film Festival. Bowles countered that possible future lawsuits by the families of the dead Iraqis meant the photos had to be edited.

Bowles said Magnolia had been put in "an untenable legal position," and that De Palma lost rights to the film's final cut in recent arbitration with the Directors Guild of America.

"We were always open about letting him make the sort of film he wanted to make," Bowles said in an interview, adding not many distribution companies would have supported the film at all.

CORPORATE POWER

De Palma, who has criticized Hollywood for not being willing to finance such independent films, said he was shocked at his own lack of editorial control.

"I can't even get the photographs out there, that was all surprising to me," he said. "What is going on here? These are war photographs. ... You see these and you go 'oh boy, this shouldn't be happening."'

The 67-year-old director said he blames "the insurance companies" for exercising too much control over film distribution. Bowles admitted Magnolia could not insure the film if it ran the unedited photos, which were too graphic to run in mainstream newspapers or television reports.

De Palma said he expected the images in "Redacted" to stir U.S. public debate about the conduct of American soldiers. Abeer Qasim Hamza al-Janabi was gang-raped, killed and burned by U.S. troops in Mahmudiya, south of Baghdad, in March 2006. Her parents and another family member were also killed.

He said the film provided a realistic portrait of U.S. troops and how "the presentation of our troops has been whitewashed" by mainstream media.

De Palma, who looked at the atrocities of conflict in the 1989 film "Casualties of War," which also centers on the rape of a young girl by U.S. soldiers, believes news coverage of wars had changed since the Vietnam War.

"We saw fallen soldiers, we saw suffering Vietnamese. We don't see any of that now," he said. "We see bombs go off, but where do they come down? Who do they hit?"

The U.S. invasion of Iraq was "clearly a mistake," he said, that was perpetuated by "defense contractors, big corporations of America" profiting from the war.

"How many billions of dollars are those companies making? And who gets more famous than ever? The media. There is nothing like a war to fill the airwaves 24 hours a day," he said.

comment #21

Mgmax, le Corbeau says ...

Go back a week and you'll find out what Jeff's take was.

comment #22

KeithNYC says ...

Ajphux,
Why would you interrupt a thread about a TV show to further your agenda to support a film that even liberal film critics are viewing as anti-American propaganda??

Why would you just not simply e-mail Jeff with the article?

If you want dialogue about it you could have simply e-mailed him and if he posted it then that would be the appropriate place to talk about it.

Thank you for making me even waste my time in writing this.

comment #23

Craig Kennedy says ...

You people are really going to sit here and argue this all over again and let X-Texan's sweet JFK reference go by without even the slightest comment?

There is just wrongness in the world. All I'm saying.

comment #24

T. Holly says ...

No, I'm not, the evidence for the second gunman theory is at the 3 minute mark. The bell doesn't fully register on Tony. Biggest mistake of his life? Maybe.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=rnT7nYbCSvM

Tony sees his future. Of course it's not going to include his brains on the wall.

comment #25

Rothchild says ...

This is one of the biggest reasons I hate Nikki Finke and will never trust a word she posts. She said that she heard the ending was done like that in case they decided to do a movie later. She never heard that. Her view of the entertainment industry led her to a bullshit conclusion that she put into her story as if it was a scoop or an actual thing she "heard" from someone in the know. Anyone in the know wouldn't tell Finke shit. The only people that talk to her are disenfranchised execs in the industry that appreciate the big pile of money they sleep on but want to feel like people are aware of their existence.

Okay, none of that was really relevant.

comment #26

T. Holly says ...

it was nikki's unfounded "pissed at Haneke" moment. if she had just seen the time cut, she wouldn't have gotten so pissed.

comment #27

rocco says ...

Those are cogent comments Keith. Don't spend too much time fretting over the denials of those who would have a difficult time understanding the instructions on a tube of toothpaste...

comment #28

KeithNYC says ...

"Those are cogent comments Keith. Don't spend too much time fretting over the denials of those who would have a difficult time understanding the instructions on a tube of toothpaste..."

Thanks for the kind words. However, I dont think the resistance to the Tony gets killed interpretation is just stupidity. I just think Chase ended the show the way he did to please the real hardcore fans of the show who truly understand the way Chase crafts a story. He rewarded the hardcore fans who will do a little "work" to find the ending. Consequently, more casual Sopranos fans (including many critics) jumped on the "easy" interpretation that Tony will always have to look over his shoudler. An interpretation which (like I said earlier) really does not hold up under closer inspection of the scene. Also at the same time (b/c they did not want to do the work) they attempt to sound intelligent by calling people who truly understand the Tony dies interpretation
"catharsis junkies". Granted the "You probably never hear it when it happens?" flashback is very obvious. However, would a casual fan realize the guy in the diner credited as "Man in Members Only Jacket" is a callback to the very first episode of the final season titled "Members Only" where clues abound? Would a casual fan really take a look at past episodes of the final season and note the eerie similarities in the murder of Gerry Torciano? Would a casual fan also notice that Chase actually filled up the screen with pure "white" for about 10 seconds when Tony's comes out of his coma early on in the final season (white out=life, black out=death)?

More importantly, there has never been an alternate explanation (besides Tony's death) for the deliberate pattern or sequence of POV shots in the final scene when the bell rings and Tony looks up. 4 straight times the bell rings and Tony looks and then there is a cut to Tony's POV. The last time (just 30 seconds after Members Only Guy goes to the bathroom) the bell rings and Tony looks up, we then cut to the blackness instead of Tony's POV of Meadow coming through the door. This suggest that this IS Tony's POV or there is a "missing POV shot" (i.e the person with the POV is no longer there). The implication being that he is dead. The "blackout" is SUBJECTIVE. Chase didnt even need the Bacala flashback or Torciano's murder to tell us Tony died. The Tony died interpretation is actually WITHIN the scene. It was just shown in an entirely unique way.

Chase is a huge fan of Kubrick, a visionary as far as POV shots. Chase may have just upstaged him.

comment #29

Rothchild says ...

I'm not going to lie, I rewatched the ending tonight after reading this blog.

comment #30

Mgmax, le Corbeau says ...

The point of ambiguity is that it has multiple plausible interpretations. Seizing on one of them and insisting that because it's plausible, it must be definitive is missing the fact that there's ambiguity. Nevertheless...

"The way it plays out, he feels, delivers "a definite sense of what Tony and Carmela's future looks like. Whether it happened that night or some other night doesn't really matter."

comment #31

TL says ...

Anyone who thinks Chase's reference to Gerry the Hairdo means Tony died didn't read very carefully. Chase is talking about endings generally, i.e., the ending of the series.

You absolutely cannot reconcile a "Tony died" theory with Chase's comment that the ending shows "a definite sense of what Tony and Carmela's future looks like."

comment #32

KeithNYC says ...

"Anyone who thinks Chase's reference to Gerry the Hairdo means Tony died didn't read very carefully. Chase is talking about endings generally, i.e., the ending of the series."

Very weak. Chase is not talking about a "meta" moment. He is talking about something specific to the narrative itself. The Torciano scene is something that has been argued about for months as the possible key to Chase's intentions. It corroborates the importance of the Bacala flashback and other scenes that express the "never hear it happen" concept of death and most importantly, Tony's death.

"You absolutely cannot reconcile a "Tony died" theory with Chase's comment that the ending shows "a definite sense of what Tony and Carmela's future looks like."

I think I did before. The statement should be "You absolutely cannot reconcile a "Tony lived" theory with Chase's comment that the suggests Tony died in the exact same manner as Jerry Torciano". The real question is which statement is more relevant to the issue. A vague statement that says if Tony doesnt die that night it will be some other night. Which is a little silly anyway as we will all die eventually. Or, Chase getting into detail about a specific scene that we can now assume he crafted w/ Tony's death in mind that suggests Tony's death. So much so that Mr.Martin (a very smart and well known writer) follows up with the obvious question "Are you saying..(Tony died?). Also notice Chase's language in the first statment. He still implies it COULD have been that night. He also uses the word "It" meaning a definite event or something abrupt and certain and does NOT sound like a slow detioration or Tony will die of old age.

The most rational conclusion is that Chase is saying he created a strong interpretation for Tony's death. BUT if you want to believe that Tony did not die that night that it will happen very soon anyway so it doesnt matter.

OR he is just trying to keep the cache of an ambiguous ending going but later on in the interview decided to really just give it up.

I tend to believe the latter b/c Chase, by saying that Tony could have lived that night undermines the construction of his own narrative that clearly lays out Tony's death. This includes the referenced Jerry Torciano murder.

But we will just have to agree to disagree!!