Crispin Glover Discusses Horror Movie Endings and the Multiple Layers They Can Have

Crispin Glover is best known for his role as George McFly in Back to the Future, but he also stars in Guillermo del Toro's new Netflix horror anthology series, Cabinet of Curiosities. During a recent interview with CB, Glover talked about what makes horror stories so great and explains why they need dark endings and how those dark or bittersweet endings can be as good or better than a happy ending. He said:

"I tend toward liking psychological terror, if you want to put it in that genre. I always thought Repulsion by Polanski was really a fantastic psychological terror film. But then I also enjoy the metaphors that sometimes happen. I always thought, of course, some of the metaphors that came through in both Night of Living Dead and Dawn of the Dead fitting into that genre. But then going back to old classic early horror like Boris Karloff as the Frankenstein Monster, it jumps around as to what I appreciate, but his performance in that is a beautiful performance. And there's a pathos. When there's a pathos within the outcast, I find that quite compelling, and that can be beautifully rendered in the horror genre. So it depends what my favorite things are in terms of the ending, some of them that I just mentioned. There's a pathos in the ending of Night of the Living Dead, and it had that kind of civil rights metaphor that was done really through casting, and I thought very eloquent. And then strangely, Dawn of the Dead was really a great commentary on shopping."

Glover then went on to discuss Frankenstein and Repulsion a bit more to drive his point home saying:

"Well, there was a pathos. You feel bad for the character that Boris Karloff plays. And Repulsion, that's a hard one to analyze. It goes through this kind of extreme delusional state where you're experiencing the delusion of the character essentially. And then it switches out, not from her perspective, but from essentially her sister's and her sister's boyfriend's perspective. And it's hard to determine -- is that a happy ending? Is it a terrible ending? It's hard to say. When the castle caves in on the character that Boris Karloff plays in Frankenstein, is that a happy ending? Is it the proper ending? Or is that a sad ending? If this is a tortured character, perhaps that's the proper bittersweet happiness that he's not having to be tortured. So I like things that have multiple layers to them in terms of endings, whether it's happy or sad. Bittersweet often is a nice way for something to end."

There are some great insights on horror films there to take in, and those comments may give you something to think about. What are some of your favorite horror movie endings of all time?