This is not the freeze-frame; I couldn't find a picture of the freeze-frame. The freeze-frame involves guns, a son, and a handshake.
This is not the freeze-frame; I couldnt find a picture of the freeze-frame. The freeze-frame involves guns, a son, and a handshake.
  • This is not the freeze-frame; I couldn’t find a picture of the freeze-frame. The freeze-frame involves guns, a son, and a handshake.

Hey film buffs: I’ve been thinking about the John Sayles movie that just closed at Northwest Film Forum, Amigo. (“John Sayles’s Best Film” “is cinema as anthropology.” I’m sorry I’m hitting you with this after it’s closed; check it on Netflix.)

I’ve been thinking about the ending, which is a freeze-frame—a stopping that’s a self-conscious picture-making, a literal framing and holding. It turns the last moment into a statement.

It’s a little hoary and agitproppy (Here! Look here! This is what I mean with this movie!).

But it’s also pleasantly surprising, using that last moment as a pivot. Sayles talks about it in an interview here.

Are there lots of movies that close on a freeze frame? I have to think it’s borrowed from some kind of tradition, but I don’t know what it is.

Jen Graves (The Stranger’s former arts critic) mostly writes about things you approach with your eyeballs. But she’s also a history nerd interested in anything that needs more talking about, from male...

25 replies on “The Freeze-Frame Ending”

  5. All I can think of is that awful blurry face shot of Daniel Radcliffe at the end of Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. Probably not exactly what we’re going for here.

  6. Freeze frame endings make me remember Police Squad with Leslie Nielsen, and the fake freeze-frames that would end the show — with someone walking through behind the scene, or taking a sip of coffee, etc. Good times.

  7. The original “Taking of Pelham 1-2-3” ends with a freeze frame of Walter Matthau re-entering a suspect’s apartment. It’s a good punch-line in this movie’s case.

  8. What is the use of it in “400 Blows,” since that seems to be the gold standard? (I’ll watch it, too, but just curious!)

    Thanks!

  9. @8 Here’s the image.

    From Wikipedia SPOILER (but not really):

    One day, while playing football with the rest of the boys, Antoine escapes under the fence and runs away to the ocean, a place he has wanted to visit his entire life. He reaches the shoreline of the sea, runs into it, then turns back to the land. The film concludes with the camera zooming in and then freezing on Antoine’s face, looking directly into the camera.

  11. Rocky, no? And, um, A Little Romance, with the radiant young Diane Lane. Stumbling across that movie was one of the happiest accidents of my boyhood.

  15. @8: “The 400 Blows” might be the first film to end with a freeze frame, or the first one to be widely seen and make an impact. I’m sure someone can bust out another example, but that’s the earliest example that comes to mind.

    And, you know, the French New Wave was kinda big or something in the evolution of film;)

  17. @11,

    Nice — I was hoping to be the one to cite that great shot of Balboa and Creed just as their fists are converging on one anothers face(s) and as it fades to a watercolor type print. Though I believe it was actually Rocky 2, no?

  18. Pre-cinema: Nikolai Gogol uses this effect at the end of the Inspector General. I always thought it to be a crazy ending to that play. All the actors standing in that “freeze frame” for a full minute and a half!

    “GENDARME.

    An official from St. Petersburg sent by imperial order has arrived, and wants to see you all at once. He is stopping at the inn.

    All are struck as by a thunderbolt. A cry of amazement bursts from the ladies simultaneously. The whole group suddenly shifts positions and remains standing as if petrified.
    SILENT SCENEThe Governor stands in the center rigid as a post, with outstretched hands and head thrown backward. On his right are his wife and daughter straining toward him. Back of them the Postmaster, turned toward the audience, metamorphosed into a question mark. Next to him, at the edge of the group, three lady guests leaning on each other, with a most satirical expression on their faces directed straight at the Governor’s family. To the left of the Governor is Zemlianika, his head to one side as if listening. Behind him is the Judge with outspread hands almost crouching on the ground and pursing his lips as if to whistle or say: “A nice pickle we’re in!” Next to him is Korobkin, turned toward the audience, with eyes screwed up and making a venomous gesture at the Governor. Next to him, at the edge of the group, are Dobchinsky and Bobchinsky, gesticulating at each other, open-mouthed and wide-eyed. The other guests remain standing stiff. The whole group retain the same position of rigidity for almost a minute and a half. The curtain falls.”

  22. gloomy gus! I love A Little Romance. The freeze frame of him running after the car and jumping so he can keep waving goodbye as the car pulls away. Wonderful.

    The freeze frame as used in sitcoms (or even when you pause a DVD on a weird moment/expression) is one of those things that I always find hilarious, followed immediately by the thought, but why is this so funny? Anyone have a guess? “Silly faces are silly,” or something more?

  24. Rocky II ends on a freeze frame of Rocky’s beaten face in the ring…with a camera panning up and to the left of that freeze-frame.

    It’s Rocky III (after Apollo teaches Rocky how to beat Clubber Lang, Apollo’s price is a “nobody watching” rematch in an empty gym) that ends with the Rocky & Apollo’s fists about to clobber each other fading into the Leroy Nieman painting ending.

    (And now, I’ve got to cue up some Cornershop to remind myself about the lessons learned…)

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