The final shot of Thelma and Louise. Image via opentravel.com.
Some endings present the sense of ending midair.
The final shot of Thelma & Louise stops with their car in midair. Sure, Thelma and Louise are about to die, but for interrupting this ending to freeze on this last moment of freedom evokes a sense of triumph.
Another example—the end of Finnegans Wake:
Yes. Carry me along, taddy, like you done through the toy fair! If I seen him bearing down on me now under whitespread wings like he'd come from Arkangels, I sink I'd die down over his feet, humbly dumbly, only to washup. Yes, tid. There's where. First. We pass through grass behush the bush to. Whish! A gull. Gulls. Far calls. Coming, far! End here. Us then. Finn, again! Take. Bussoftlhee, mememormee! Till thousendsthee. Lps. The keys to. Given! A way a lone a last a loved a long the
The final lines of Finnegan’s Wake by James Joyce.
Difficult as Joyce's prose may be, one can get a sense of what ending mid-sentence does. It conveys the sense of motion with a vividness that a concluded thought cannot equal.
Two musical analogs to these include . . .
The razor cut at the end of “I Want You / She’s So Heavy” evokes desperation, and this builds through the lengthy outro. Interrupting the song brings home the sense that for this singer, everything is beyond his control.
Meshell Ndegeocello’s “Wasted Time” also ends with a hard cut, and this interruption gives weight to the song’s theme. If time is a precious resource that must not be wasted, it may be gone before we have a chance to ready ourselves.
Thank you for reading.