Hide And Seek Ending Explained- Jacob, Noah And Who Was The Killer In This Twisty Thriller?
The American remake of Jung Huh’s Hide And Seek by Joel David Moore is a creepy little chiller that sneaks up on you. It is a psychological thriller featuring hidden dangers and dark family secrets, starring Jonathon Rhys Meyers, Jacinda Barrett, and Joe Pantoliano. There are red herrings, twists, and enough social commentary to be interesting rather than distracting. What starts as a brother’s desire to find and help his only family quickly becomes a fight for his life in this mind-trip that doesn’t stop. Here’s everything you need to know about the ending of Hide and Seek.
Noah Blackwell is a successful architect and business that purchases and restores historically relevant buildings. He is a man driven by his obsessive compulsions and the love of his family. He also has a troubled past that plays out in flashbacks. His father was a rigid, harsh man who picked one son to nurture and another to ignore. His mother committed suicide, and he found her dead in the bathtub. What led to her suicide we can only speculate, but it appeared Noah’s father was at the very least verbally abusive. Noah’s half-brother was prone to outbursts and later joined the military.
After serving time, he fell out of favor with the family and has struggled to hold a job and a stable home. On the other hand, Noah lives with his family in a gorgeous Upper West Side New York apartment. Despite being a very gossiped-about result of an affair, Noah had inherited the family business when his father died. Jacob has been cut off from the family and legally ordered to stay away. When he thinks his mentally unstable long-lost brother is living in his latest acquisition, he tries to find him and instead finds some things are better left alone.
The film opens with the death of Gina, a young woman living in one of the apartments of a building slated for demolition. Someone dressed in head-to-toe black invades her home inexplicably and clubs her to death. The shocking murder has no explanation and sets the tone for what is to come. We don’t know how this helmet-wearing fiend gets in and out yet, but that is the key to deciphering what is happening to the building and later to Noah.
What happens at the end of Hide and Seek?
After Noah returns to the apartment his brother had been living in, he finds the apartment has been cleared out and divided amongst the others. Min Jinn tells Noah that his brother lives inside. He is obviously confused about what that means until he finds a hidden space behind Gina’s apartment. He believes this space was where Jacob was living. One of the twin brothers who live in the derelict apartment beat up Noah because he believed Noah or Jacob had killed his girlfriend, Gina. They were not involved in any other way with any that happened otherwise.
After escaping the twins, Noah travels back across town to his fancy apartment, where his lawyer and building security meet him. Noah is convinced his brother is responsible for the coded pictures outside the apartment doors. Because he never sees Jacob’s face, he convinces himself that Jacob is after him and his family. In reality, Soo Mi is the one who wants to take his life. She doesn’t care so much about his wife and kids as she does want his apartment.
After creating a hole in the wall of his apartment, Noah finds evidence that someone may have been living in the walls. He again races across town to Jacob’s old apartment to confront his brother but finds video footage in Gina’s apartment that shows the actual wall dweller and killer is Soo Mi. Not only did she kill Gina, but she also killed Jacob, who is lying on a pile of garbage in the wall space. He also finds a picture of the Parkmore his home and knows that the person who coveted his apartment was Soo Mi.
At the beginning of the final act, the black helmeted person gets into Noah’s building and tries to get into the apartment when Noah’s wife goes down to the lobby to get a package. This is Soo Mi, who follows Noah back and forth across town at different times. She ultimately stabs Noah’s wife, and she and Noah fight, leading to a fire and her death.
We think Noah also died in the fire, but the final shot spins everything one last time. Noah is alive and recovering. He saved the building his brother had been living in, and the entire group, including the twins, were able to stay in their homes. Noah’s family has relocated to a more rural setting to heal. Noah killed Soo Mi, but Min Jinn survived, and it appears she is living in the walls of Noah’s old apartment where an unsuspecting new family is getting ready to move in.
Was Noah’s brother involved?
Noah’s brother, Jacob, is a mentally unstable man who lived in the same apartment building as Soo Mi. He was estranged from Noah’s family, and the estate had an order of protection against him to prevent him from confronting Noah or getting his hands on the money. As a result, Jacob couldn’t make rent, and everyone thought he had skipped town. Instead of taking his lawyer’s(Joe Pantoliano) advice, Noah tracks down the building and questions the manager about his brother. He claims he hasn’t seen him in weeks, and his possessions will be removed from the apartment if his rent isn’t paid immediately.
Little MIn Jinn lives with her mother in the building. But, as we later find out, she lives in the walls between apartments. Soo Mi is a caretaker for an older Russian woman who is the last remaining inhabitant of the building from its hay day. Soo Mi appears to be a caring mother simply looking to protect her daughter and give her a better life. However, when Noah shows her a picture of his brother, Soo Mi freaks out and says he was a monster that never deserved to live there. This is the first clue that she is not what she seems.
Jacob may have been unstable and a problem for his family, but he was not a killer and had not been stalking Noah. Soo Mi killed him and left him on a pile of garbage bags in her hidey-hole. He probably scared Min Jinn, and that is why Soo Mi killed him. Jacob had problems, but he is not to blame for anything that happened in the movie.
What are the symbols in Hide and Seek and who made them?
When Noah inspects his brother’s apartment, he finds three symbols which he later finds in his apartment building. They are a circle, triangle, and square. In addition, there are hash marks after each indicating how many men, women, and children live in the apartment. Noah thinks this is something his brother did when in reality, Soo Mi did this. We don’t know why she kept such careful records, but this was not Jacob’s work.
What does I am not a ghost mean?
Noah’s mother wrote this on a note that she left beside her dead body. Later Noah finds it written on the wall of Jacob’s bathroom and thinks it is proof that his half-brother is haunting him. In reality, Jacob was disturbed by finding his mother, and this phrase has meaning to him because he feels as if he was becoming a ghost himself. It is a cry for help. Unfortunately, before Jabob could get help, Soo Mi killed him.
Hide and Seek is a twisty movie that keeps you engaged the entire time. Similar to Aftermath, starring Sean Ashmore and Ashley Greene, you don’t know exactly what is happening until the very end. Not until the conclusion do you really know if Noah or Jacob are involved and whether or not they are mentally ill. In the end, it is a deranged and desperate mother who lost her way in her desire to give her child a better life. Hide and Seek is streaming everywhere VOD right now.
As the Managing Editor for Signal Horizon, I love watching and writing about genre entertainment. I grew up with old-school slashers, but my real passion is television and all things weird and ambiguous. My work can be found here and Travel Weird, where I am the Editor in Chief.