I'm Thinking of Ending Things (2020)
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2025-09 to 2026-08
The story
A young woman travels with her boyfriend to a remote farm to meet his parents. As they journey together, the narrative is intercut with the mundane routine of an elderly janitor working at a high school. The atmosphere grows increasingly strange as the woman begins to experience inconsistencies in her surroundings and memories. While the couple navigates the complexities of their relationship during the trip, the two seemingly unrelated stories of the woman and the janitor begin to converge, creating a sense of mounting tension and surrealism as they approach the third act of the film.
Full plot (contains spoilers)
A woman and her boyfriend, Jake, travel to a farm to meet his parents. During the trip, the narrative alternates between their journey and the life of a school janitor. The woman experiences a series of unsettling events: she finds strange items in a laundry room, hears mysterious voices, and notices her surroundings shifting. Jake's parents physically transform during the night. On the drive home, the couple experiences a surreal detour at an ice cream stand where the staff are students. Jake eventually confronts the janitor at his school, leading to a dream-like sequence where they watch figures resembling themselves perform a 'dream ballet.' The janitor then experiences hallucinations of the parents and a talking pig. The film concludes with a surreal scene of an older Jake receiving a Nobel Prize on a stage, followed by a final shot of the school parking lot where the couple's car is gone and the janitor's truck is covered in snow.
- First release year
- 2020
- Runtime (minutes)
- 134
- Production countries
- United States
- Original languages
- English
- Directors
- Charlie Kaufman
- Writers
- Charlie Kaufman · screenplay
- Cast and characters
- Jesse Plemons · Jake; Jessie Buckley · a young woman; Toni Collette · parent; David Thewlis · parent; Guy Boyd · school janitor
- Genres
- surrealist; psychological thriller
- Themes
- human condition; identity; memory
- Tone and mood
- unsettling; surreal; dream-like
- Setting
- A farm and a high school in the United States.
- Premise and plot tags
- psychological thriller; surrealism; magical realism
- Source material / true-story basis
- 2016 novel by Iain Reid
- Content notes
- nightmares
- Reception
- The film received positive reviews from critics who praised the lead performances and the cinematography. It was described as a daringly unexpected film with a surreal final act.
- Reported review scores
- Metacritic · score: 78 · scale: 100 · review count: 46
Film metadata comes from the open sources listed in Credits & Contact. Catalogue details may be incomplete.
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