The Home Has the Year’s Craziest Ending So Far

by

Spoilers ahead for the plot and ending of The Home.

As a fan of horror movies, I’ve witnessed many unconventional endings, some gruesome, others confusing – all part of the genre. Occasionally, a movie comes along with a finale so disturbing and twisted that it lingers in my mind. Such is the case with “The Home,” the latest work by James DeMonaco, creator of “The Purge.” Initially, the film seems like typical fear-of-old-age material. However, in its final 20 minutes, it veers off in a direction I didn’t expect, leaving me impressed by its boldness. Despite my reservations about the overall quality of “The Home,” I am captivated by its ending, which I can’t help but share with friends and family, driven by an unexplained urge to spread the word.

In “The Home,” Davidson portrays Max, a troubled youth grappling with the tragic loss of his foster brother Luke, who died when Max was a child. After a brush with the law, Max’s foster parents, Sylvia (Jessica Hecht) and Couper (Victor Williams), manage to keep him from serving jail time by assigning him custodial duties at Green Meadows. Shortly after his arrival, Max encounters some disturbing situations: a resident engaging in sexual activity while wearing a mask similar to one used in the movie “Strangers,” a woman who suddenly starts bleeding excessively during water aerobics, and eerie screams coming from the off-limits fourth floor. Upon investigating upstairs, Max finds residents who seem catatonic, drooling, and crying blood. An elderly man in a wheelchair shouts at him and attempts to attack. It doesn’t take a genius to realize that something is deeply amiss within this institution, a fact further emphasized when a kind resident named Norma (Mary Beth Peil) advises Max, “This place has serious problems.” However, shortly after Norma urges Max to flee, she appears to jump from a window to her death, impaling herself on the iron gate below.

As events unfold, it becomes clear that a sinister plot is unveiled, though its significance will shortly prove irrelevant. Max stumbles upon a blacklight in his room with the instruction to “FIND THE MARKED ONES,” leading him to identify inhabitants adorned with an “X” on their necks. He unearths Norma’s journal, which carries the chilling passage, “They come at night with their needles and their dogs, altering us as well.” This could explain Lou’s (John Glover) recurring episodes, including his bizarre behavior of extracting his own teeth.

A mysterious woman contacts Max on a fetish site called Faceless Fantasies. At a later time, she visits him in person, revealing that the government supports facilities like Green Meadows through funding, using residents as test subjects for experimental drugs and treatments. This revelation aligns with Max’s research on Dr. Sabian (Bruce Altman) of Green Meadows, whose controversial eye therapy led to his exclusion from the medical community.

However, if you believe you have figured out where this story is headed, I must correct you—you are off the mark. Attempting to piece together the conspiracy only serves to distract and waste your time.

Over the course of events, Max seems to be losing strength. His sleep is poor, plagued by nightmares where Dr. Sabian performs medical treatments on him and Luke crying for aid. Upon returning home, he seeks rest and regrouping, but Sylvia’s casual comment hints at her knowing more than she’s revealing. After she departs, Max explores and discovers a secret room in the house containing an altar dedicated to Dea, the Roman goddess of youth (though The Home doesn’t concern itself with specific details, so we’ll refer to Dea). This hidden space also houses photo albums spanning decades that show his foster parents socializing with Dr. Sabian, Green Meadows staff, Norma, Lou, and other residents. These individuals never seem to age or alter their appearance, but a different young person in a wheelchair is prominently featured in each party photo – Luke being one of them. Suddenly, Max realizes the truth. He rushes back to the retirement home and forces his way onto the fourth floor, as he now understands that the old man in the wheelchair was trying to communicate something significant: He’s Luke. The residents on this floor are actually the young people from the party photos, who have been mysteriously transformed into near-conscious centenarians. Here’s where it gets even more astonishing…

Prior to a heartfelt reunion between the foster brothers, Max is surreptitiously drugged by Les, an employee from Green Meadows. When he regains consciousness, he finds himself bound in a wheelchair amidst the party depicted in the photo albums. However, not everyone is present; Norma, who genuinely aimed to safeguard Max, was eliminated due to her efforts. Lou then discloses that everything we’ve witnessed up until this point … was a fabrication. “The wounds on our throats, the government plot, Faceless Fantasies, my hallucinations, all part of the elaborate story we cooked up to amuse ourselves at your expense while you provided for us at night,” Lou explains. “We did it for our amusement!

You might find yourself annoyed that The Home squandered over an hour of your valuable time on trivialities, or you could view it as a daring middle finger to its viewers. In truth, the events unfolding are far more entertaining than a government-led mystery. Dr. Sabian reveals that there’s a minor sac located behind a person’s right eye which stores Dea’s nectar, providing youth and vigor. They have been extracting this liquid from Max every night and consuming it, a practice they have continued with their selected Green Meadows volunteers since the previous century. The Dea cult entertains themselves by manipulating victims such as Max to combat boredom in their advanced ages. (Max’s foster parents are 109 years old. Lou is an astounding 128!). Tonight, they plan on extracting even more of Dea’s nectar from Max, a quantity sufficient to make him feel like a centenarian. The scene unfolds with Dr. Sabian inserting a needle into Max’s eye and draining him, while the cult members close by engage in an orgy due to the aphrodisiac effects of Dea’s nectar. Surprisingly, The Home becomes even more outrageous from this point onward.

When Max wakes up on the fourth floor, he’s groggy and half-aware. He manages to see Luke take a spoke from his wheelchair and poke it into another resident’s eye, causing her to squirt out goop into a cup that Luke catches below. Luke then stabs every fourth-floor resident’s eyes, collecting the fluid in a cup, which he later refers to as “Dea’s nectar.” He forces Max to drink it all. When I saw Max’s pupils dilate, I came close to cheering. Indeed, he has gained some sort of power from Dea and is seeking revenge. He picks up a hammer and an ax and sets about injuring and killing every member of the cult in Green Meadows. The last ten minutes of the movie The Home show Pete Davidson drenched in blood and hacking apart many elderly people. It’s all so gruesome and excessively violent – with decapitated hands, bones protruding from limbs, and castration with a hammer – that you might find yourself laughing. I’m not sure if this is the response the director intended, but the sudden burst of extreme gore feels unjustified and confusing. This movie is quite silly, and it becomes more enjoyable in its chaotic, illogical moments.

Max’s actions in the movie can be seen as symbolic of the frustration and anger that younger generations feel towards older generations for taking away their future and leaving them with a world they didn’t create. Max, near the end of his rampage, tells Lou, who is dying, “I’m taking it all back.” This scene is followed by Max and other residents exiting Green Meadows, where they’ve drained the eye juices from dead members of a cult symbolizing the Boomers.

In an interview, DeMonaco explained that the movie was intended as an allegory for climate change, stating, “It was about the previous generation taking everything away from this generation.” While some may find Max’s actions excessive, they can still relate to his anger, which is a very real and pressing sentiment among Gen-X individuals like DeMonaco.

In essence, I find it hard to agree that the unusual conclusion of this film provides much depth for reflection. Despite the good intentions behind The Home, its symbolic message can’t keep up with the intense violence. After witnessing Pete Davidson drink eyeball juice and kill elderly people, environmental concerns are far from one’s thoughts.

Read More

2025-07-25 01:55