How Does Slacker End?

You’ve got to see ‘Slacker’. It’s one of those strange movies that kinda confuses you but also is really cool. It doesn’t really have a plot or anything and it just follows all of these random people around in Austin and they’re all kinda weird. The ending is really cool and very random. The last scene follows this guy who steals a car and then drives off into the night speaking about some conspiracy. It’s real odd but I think it’s kinda fitting for the movie. The whole movie kinda just was following this guy through his day and it was really odd. So the end kinda just is more of the same which is why I liked it. It’s real weird and don’t expect much of a plot and especially don’t expect an ending to any of the plots. This movie is called ‘Slacker’ for a reason and it really does a good job of portraying a ‘slacker’.

This film is so much fun because Linklater is shooting a series of vignettes and he’s just wandering around with a camera, following people around. It’s really great because he captures the essence of a lot of different people and it’s really great that he doesn’t do too much with any of them because sometimes less is more. I really love the ending of Slacker, where this guy steals a car and drives off into the night. It’s a really cool ending because it’s like a little wink to the audience and it’s saying, “Hey, none of this really matters. It was just fun to watch all these people.” Slacker is a movie about wandering. It’s a movie about how much fun it can be to be aimless, to just kind of meander through life. After watching it a few times, I really get where Linklater is coming from with Slacker. He’s not trying to take us anywhere, he’s just showing us these weird and wonderful detours along the way.

The end of Slacker is so amazing because it is just more of the same chaos and uncertainty that the rest of the movie has. It doesn’t attempt to go back on what the rest of the movie has established, instead it just follows another random character in a series of bizarre vignettes. The way it Hop-scotches between characters and stories is amazing to begin with, and then when it finally does land on one character the only thing he does is steal a car and ramble on and on about conspiracies. He then peels out and disappears into the night, and the movie is over. It is brilliant in part because it is so unexpected. It really subverts your expectations again and again. Often a movie will be building up to something, and you’ll be on the edge of your seat waiting for it to happen, only to realize that nothing has happened. That is basically the whole of Slacker. The final scene is a perfect exemplar of this. It is just a complete and utter shrug. It is the perfect ending to a film that is already just one big complete and utter shrug of a movie. It’s just so amazing because it is so very much itself.

I was confounded the first time I watched Slacker at the end of it. The film doesn’t end like typical films. They try to give you closure and usually give you a sense of complete satisfaction. Not this film. This film is like life and leaves many questions unanswered. The ending is reminiscent of a mad dream and even after you’ve processed everything that happened before it, it can be confusing to try and understand it. I think the best way to understand it is to leave it for yourself to interpret and think about after the film has ended. The last scene with the paranoia-crazed slacker jumps into a random car and takes off for parts unknown. He is talking excitedly about how he can now tell everyone that he’s positive that the government is out to get him and that he has solid proof too.

I have to admit that for a long time I was slightly disappointed by the ending of Slacker. In retrospect, however, it makes perfect sense because the whole film already mirrors the feeling of aimlessness and not knowing where you’re going. Most of the characters in the film are just floating from one moment to the next and the conversations they have range from speculation about UFOs and possible anarchy to Madonna’s pap smear. The ending of the film leaves you with many of the same questions that you were asked to ponder throughout the movie. I have come to appreciate how ‘Slacker’ trusts the viewer to ponder their way through the film’s vast and diffuse expanse of experience. If you’re someone who requires closure in your films and therefore your life, then ‘Slacker’ will surely drive you to madness. But for those of you who are perfectly okay with ambiguity then ‘Slacker’ is a most singular and, yes, very satisfying experience.