'Censor' had a Great Premise that Left Me Unsatisfied with the Ending

Censor could have been one of my favorite horror movies, but due to the ending, I wasn't exactly thrilled. Censor is a psychological horror movie that was executed so well, right until the ending arrived. The movie follows the story of a young woman named Enid, who is working in the film censoring industry for movies, is going through a lot of trauma she hasn't been able to move on from.

Her sister, Nina, had gone missing when she was only two years old.

Enid believes that she is still out there, and becomes determined to locate her. What was sad about this story, was that her parents were the complete opposite. They believed that Nina was gone, but Enid did not want to give up. I felt so bad for Enid, and I thought the director did such a good job with portraying someone who was in denial.

Enid does eventually find some sort of clue linked to her sister's disappearance, and this is where the movie goes from good to just plain weird.

Enid gets pulled into a production of a horror movie, and she believes the director had something to do with her sister's disappearance. She goes along with the movie production, becoming an actress for this mysterious movie that is being filmed in the woods...where her sister had actually gone missing so many years ago.

She meets another woman that is a part of the movie, named Alice. She continues to go along with the production, and at some point, she goes insane. She kills the guy that was playing the villain in the movie, because Enid is no longer in reality. Due to the censoring company she was associated with, Enid had completely given herself to this world, no longer aware of what is real anymore.

She starts to believe that Alice is actually her missing sister, and Alice understandably freaks out with Enid's behavior. Alice attempts to escape from Enid, but she isn't able to escape from her. Enid takes her in a vehicle, and Enid is now picturing the world around her as a peaceful place, and Enid is now happy, as she is driving who she believes to be her sister back to her parents home.

Alice is also happy with Enid, but we get a glimpse of Alice screaming in total fear. Enid shows up to her parents home, and Alice comes out of the car, happy to greet her parents. Everyone rejoices, happy they are now a family again. In reality, Alice is begging Enid's parents to save her from Enid, and the parents express moments of shock with Enid.

The movie ends with Enid laughing, and she looks terrifying.

I know what the director was going for, but the ending went way too overboard. I feel that the production scene in the third act went on for way too long. The director was trying to go for the retro cool ending of Enid going crazy over her trauma, becoming sucked into a reality where she reunites with Nina.

And there was something that did confuse me a lot.

I think the director was trying to say that Enid actually killed her sister all those years ago, and that is why she is working for a film censoring company, because she is against violence, not wanting to believe what she had done to her own sister.

It is a pretty good idea, but the execution did not work for me. The ending shot was pretty eerie with Enid laughing, but if the ending had been slightly changed up, I think this last shot of the film could have been so effective.

I'm not saying that the director should have really told the audience what Enid had done to her sister, but if the director had gone for a total mystery ending instead of focusing so much on the third act with the production of the horror movie, I think the ending could have been much better.

Censor was a great idea that unfortunately left me feeling conflicted with the ending that definitely needed a lot of changes.

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Thank you for reading!

Emy Quinn