The Ending Of The Uninvited Explained
Released in 2009, "The Uninvited" isn't quite the blood-curdling horror movie you might expect from its spooky poster. It's actually a remake of the 2003 Korean horror movie "A Tale of Two Sisters," starring Emily Browning as Anna, a young girl whose close bond with her sister Alex (Arielle Kebbel) is tested after a boathouse fire kills their mother. Traumatized, Anna's psyche seemingly buries her memories of the night of the fire, and after a stint in a psychiatric hospital, she's shaken to return home and find her father (David Strathairn) already engaged to Rachel (Elizabeth Banks), who was once her dead mother's live-in nurse.
You might not find the blood-curdling shocks and scares of "The Ring" here, but you will find some bone-chilling plot twists in "The Uninvited" that have had audiences dumbstruck for over a decade. It's not just a single head-scratching revelation, but a string of jaw-dropping reversals that require some mental gymnastics to unravel. In a complex tale involving ghostly apparitions, a spine-tingling murder mystery, and plenty of dark, hidden secrets, there's lots to uncover and even more to keep you guessing. So if you're looking for answers and an easy guide to everything you need to know about the ending of "The Uninvited," look no further.
What you need to know about The Uninvited
"The Uninvited" concerns Anna, a teenager released from a psychiatric hospital after the fiery death of her ailing mother. Returning home, Anna reunites with her older sister Alex but is bitter towards her father, who just 10 months after the tragedy has already gotten serious with a new woman. Even more upsetting is that the new bride-to-be is Rachel, the nurse who had been caring for Anna's mother in the final days of her life and whose presence casts a pall over the household. But after Anna begins to have disturbing visions of dead children and a zombified version of her mother, she begins to suspect that not all is as it seems, and Rachel may be responsible.
With her sister's help, Anna soon deduces that Rachel may not be who she claims. Her name has been changed, and her previous life is shrouded in mystery. Suspecting that her father's new lover may have murdered their mother, Anna and Alex set out to prove their theory before she can kill again, all while images of the dead continue to haunt them.
When Anna's friend Matt reveals that he witnessed what really happened the night her mother was killed, she finally believes she has the proof she needs — until Matt turns up dead. Now, the only way to stop Rachel's killing spree may be to confront her directly, putting Anna and Alex in the path of a possible serial killer.
What really happened the night of the fire
Throughout "The Uninvited," we're told that Rachel is a dangerous woman who may have killed Anna's mother. If they're not careful, Anna and her sister Alex could be next, as it's believed that Rachel is a serial killer with a history of seducing older, married family men and killing their families. And it's not just the visions that tell Anna that Rachel killed her mother. All of the evidence points to her father's new lover having a secret life, and Rachel's affair with her father gives her plenty of motive for murder.
As the film progresses, we're led to believe that the fire that destroyed the boathouse was a murder scheme carried out by Rachel, but the reality is even more shocking. After Anna discovered her father having sex with her mother's nurse, she became vengeful and wanted to strike back at them both for betraying her mother. To that end, Anna planned to burn down the family home and went into the boathouse to fill a canister full of gasoline. But while doing so, she left a trail of flammable gas running from the tank, which set the boathouse ablaze when she slammed the door shut and knocked a candle from a table.
The resulting explosion killed Anna's sick mother instantly. The experience proved so traumatic for Anna, however, that she buried the memories of that night, and everyone else has since believed that her mother's death was a terrible accident.
The jaw-dropping twist ending
At the heart of "The Uninvited" is the relationship between sisters Anna and Alex, who form a united front against Rachel. Anna and Alex discover that Rachel changed her name and may in fact be Mildred Kemp, a caregiver who murdered a woman and her three daughters in 1996 at the age of 19 and was never caught by authorities. In the film's nail-biting climax, Anna and Alex plan to steal Rachel's pearl necklace that they're certain was stolen from Kemp's previous victim, giving authorities proof of their sinister allegation.
The confrontation goes wrong, though, when Rachel figures out what they're up to. When the dust settles, Alex appears to have murdered Rachel with a kitchen knife in an act of deadly self-defense. But in the film's most devastating twist, Anna's father reveals that Alex isn't real and that for the entire film, she's been a figment of Anna's imagination. The horrible truth is that the fire that killed Anna's mother also took the life of her sister, and she's imagined Alex ever since. Moreover, we realize that Rachel wasn't the deranged murderer Anna believed her to be. The entire story was concocted in her head to help her cope with the guilt of having killed her mother and sister.
What's the meaning behind Anna's dreams?
Throughout "The Uninvited," Anna experiences a series of waking dreams — visions of the dead, all appearing to be warning her of a coming calamity. At the start of the film, she describes one of these visions to her doctor just before she's released from the hospital, and in it, she discovers the chopped-up corpse of a little girl in a trash bag in the woods. Later, she sees the corpse of her mother emerging from the darkness and issuing a dire warning that she's going to be next.
But that's not all. After her friend Matt is found dead in a lake — the victim of an apparent murder — she's paid a visit by the young man in her room with a grotesque, twisted spine. It's only after that vision that she learns he broke his back when he fell into the water, suggesting that there's more to her nightmarish hallucinations than meets the eye. The movie makes us think that these are the dead speaking to Anna from beyond the grave, but in reality, these apparitions are something else entirely.
After the startling revelation of what really happened the night of the fire, we realize these hallucinations are Anna's subconscious trying to reach her and remind her of the truth. In the end, the film isn't quite the supernatural horror slasher we're led to believe. Instead, it's a mind-bending psychological thriller about a young woman dealing with the mental torment of a family tragedy.
What really happened to Alex?
The ending of "The Uninvited" is a series of escalating plot twists that can get a little confusing. Between revelations that much of what we see is all in Anna's head and that a major character doesn't even exist, it may be hard to unravel what really happened when all is said and done. So, what really happens in "The Uninvited?" For starters, despite her heavy presence in the film's story, Anna's sister Alex is never really there. In fact, the ending provides a series of brief flashbacks to earlier moments in the film that reveal that nobody other than Anna ever responded to Alex's actions on-screen.
It's also revealed that some of the most horrific acts carried out in the film weren't the doings of Rachel or Alex, but of Anna herself. We learn that Matt actually did meet up with Anna at the rocks to tell her what he saw the night of the fire, and that it was Anna who murdered him because he could have given away her dark secret. It wasn't Alex who murdered Rachel in self-defense and cut up her body, but Anna, still mad with rage over her relationship with her father.
The truth is, Anna never truly healed from the trauma of her mother and Alex's death. She may have convinced the doctors at the hospital that she was well, but after coming home, she kills Rachel. The closing of the film sees her back in the hospital and seemingly happy to have finished off the woman who ruined her once-blissful home life.
The meaning of Mildred Kemp
Through her own investigation, Anna comes to believe that Rachel is in fact Mildred Kemp, a woman who murdered three children in a horrific 1996 incident. But if Rachel was never really a murderer and Anna's the one responsible for mistakenly killing her own mother, who is Rachel really, and who is the real Mildred Kemp?
At the end of the film, we learn that Rachel did in fact change her name, but it had nothing to do with escaping a previous murder rap. Instead, she did so to get away from an abusive ex-boyfriend. As for Mildred, in a final, surprising twist, we learn that one of the patients in the hospital with Anna is in fact a woman named Mildred Kemp. But one question still remains: Is Mildred simply a patient whose name Anna uses in her elaborate fantasy, or was she really a nanny who fell in love with a married man and murdered his wife and children?
The movie suggests that it's the latter, as we briefly see Mildred handling a pearl necklace, which is mentioned earlier in the film as a prize possession that Kemp stole from one of her victims. Yet, there's actually an alternate ending to the film that sheds a different light on Mildred and her impact on the story.
An alternate ending has terrifying implications
If you've only seen "The Uninvited" when it was originally in theaters, or more recently on streaming, you might not be aware that the film actually has an alternate ending. Provided as a deleted scene on the film's home video release not long after its theatrical run, this extended ending gives more context and definitive answers to a few lingering questions, while still leaving some ambiguity. The deleted moment comes at the very close of the film after Anna has been remanded back to the psychiatric hospital, where she is visited by Dr. Silberling.
In the theatrical cut, the scene concludes with fellow patient Mildred Kemp sifting through her pockets before welcoming Anna back to the hospital. But the alternate version offers a longer scene that audiences didn't see in cinemas. This extended scene shows Kemp being far more direct with Anna, telling her that "now everything is right" for her, Anna, and "the children in the woods." Not only does this more firmly establish that Kemp's murder spree wasn't just invented by Anna, but it also presents a frightening possibility about her role in the movie's events.
Given Mildred's claim that Rachel's murder at Anna's hands put things right, it could be that she was more directly involved than we thought. Is it possible that Mildred intentionally helped push Anna deeper into her own delusions and urged her to commit the murder? It's a scenario that becomes more possible thanks to the deleted scene.
What has Emily Browning said about the ending?
Fans may recognize Emily Browning, who plays Anna, from her role in the 2004 film "A Series of Unfortunate Events." It was on that film that producer Walter F. Parks decided he wanted to cast her in a thriller. After Browning spent some time away from acting to focus on school, he did just that, hiring her for "The Uninvited," where she was faced with new challenges.
Working on a film with a major plot twist that changes the way the audience views the story, Browning had to deal with some complexities on "The Uninvited" that proved difficult. "It's like there was almost two different stories and you're playing both of them," she told the Australian outlet Female. "You're playing one with the audience, with the real story always in the back of your mind." It also meant being careful about what was revealed to avoid spoiling the eye-popping ending. "You need the audience not to guess, but then be able to think about what they've seen and get it. That's hard," Browning said.
Making sure that everything worked between the two different sides of the story made filming meticulous, too. "There were times we had to pause before shooting a scene to make sure we didn't reveal something we shouldn't," Browning told Female. In the end, it all worked out, and "The Uninvited" stands as a horror flick that begs for a second watch.
What have the filmmakers said about the ending of The Uninvited?
The complex nature of "The Uninvited" wasn't just a challenge for members of the cast. Producer Walter F. Parkes noted in the DVD featurette "Unlocking the Uninvited" how delicate of a line the filmmakers had to walk in telling one story with two separate perspectives. "Certainly the biggest challenge was to have the movie operate on both levels simultaneously," he said.
This was echoed by co-directors Thomas and Charles Guard, who faced a series of production-related challenges when confronted with the nature of the story. "We also wanted to make sure that when you got to the end of the film you could look back over it and it would still make sense," Thomas said. "It was very complicated because you had to make sure that the scenes could play both ways." The director also noted that different perspectives created production issues, too. "Any scene with Alex in it, when we came to shoot it was always complicated and took a long time to block," he said.
"It was challenging to kind of construct the rules," Charles explained. "[Alex] could interact with anything when she was in the presence of only Anna, but when she was with other members of the family she couldn't touch anything." But just because it was a challenge doesn't mean it wasn't fun. The brothers and co-directors emphasized how exciting and fulfilling it was to craft a movie with such a powerful payoff at the end.
How does the ending of The Uninvited differ from the original version?
"The Uninvited" isn't original, but rather a remake of a Korean movie called "A Tale of Two Sisters." While the two films have much in common, the original — written and directed by Kim Jee-woon — is quite different, and its ending is arguably even more tragic. Released in 2003, "A Tale of Two Sisters" centers on Su-mi, a young girl who returns from a psychiatric hospital, reunites with her sister Su-yeon, and finds their father remarried to new stepmother Eun-joo. As Su-mi and Su-yeon struggle to deal with the changes in their home life, a series of unexplained ghostly horrors befall the household.
Less about the mystery of who killed their mother, "A Tale of Two Sisters" nevertheless originated the same plot twists seen in "The Uninvited." Like in the American remake, Su-yeon turns out to be a hallucination, having died when their mother attempted to take her own life after discovering her husband's affair with Eun-joo. But in the original, the version of Eun-joo seen in the movie is also a twisted alternate personality of Su-mi. Unlike "The Uninvited," "A Tale of Two Sisters" also reveals that the stepmother is partly responsible for the death of Su-mi's sister, who she could have saved.
Though the two films vary significantly in style and substance, the changes allow both versions to feel unique and distinct. This ultimately helps "The Uninvited" to stand apart, with a clever ending all its own
If you or anyone you know is having suicidal thoughts, please call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline by dialing 988 or by calling 1-800-273-TALK (8255).
How fans and critics reacted to the ending of The Uninvited
As a horror movie aimed mostly at teens, "The Uninvited" didn't satisfy everyone with its generally tame PG-13 tone. Its ending, while fresh and clever to some who went in not expecting it to have such a twist, disappointed others who found it unexciting. Critics were generally less impressed, with Xan Brooks of The Guardian let down by its climax, calling it "a denouement that somehow manages to be more outlandish – and more comic – than all the bumps and rattles that went before." Others were more than happy with it, though, with Michael Gingold of Fangoria praising its ending, writing, "The final round of revelations brings satisfying closure and a touch of chill."
Fans are another story, though. Over on Rotten Tomatoes, viewers have cautioned prospective viewers not to expect a scare-filled ghost story, and those who didn't like the ending of the film tended to be those looking for a true horror movie. Those who enjoyed the twists seemed to be more open to the film's unconventional take on the genre and didn't mind the lack of blood-curdling scares.