Sleeping Beauty 2011 Ending Explained- Why Did Lucy Scream At The End And The Horror Of Vulnerability

2011’s Sleeping Beauty by writer and director Julia Leigh is an exorcise in uncomfortability. It is a rumination of the male gaze, female vulnerability and abuse, and depression. Utilizing long, often quiet shots that feel as voyeuristic as any webcam, Leigh’s movie wants you to feel tense. The camera holds you in a suspended animation of dread and horror as we watch the innocent being corrupted by the greedy, wealthy, cruel, and callous. The film’s ending has long shocked and confused watchers. Why did Lucy scream at the end of Sleeping Beauty? Did she intend to kill herself, or did the full weight of what happened to her finally hit her? Here is everything you need to know.

Lucy(Emily Browning of Sucker Punch) can endure a lot physically. We see her agree to pretty horrific lab tests for money without hardly flinching. Maybe a little gagging, but considering what she does later, gagging was just a precursor. I’m not kink-shaming, nor do I have anything against sex workers. If all parties are consensual and there are no extra partners who are being cheated on, I think they are a viable service. Sex therapy is also vital work. When power imbalances are at play, however, sex work is dangerous. That line is crossed when Lucy enters a secret world of sleeping beauties and rich men who pay for them.

Lucy’s sister and her boyfriend, whom she lives with, are insufferable twats, her workload is exhausting, and she feels like she is going nowhere very fast. Her alcoholic mother uses her credit card without regard, and everyone around her is as flat and lifeless as she feels. The only glimmer of life is her friend Birdmann, who is not so slowly killing himself with alcohol. Needing to come up with money in a hurry, she takes a great-paying job with a mysterious company that caters to wealthy men who like naked sleeping women. It is the ultimate in vulnerability and requires her to consent to be drugged so men can fulfill their erotic fantasies. Penetration is not permitted, but fondling and caressing are.

Quickly, she makes enough money to move into a lovely apartment of her own. Things are looking up for her if you overlook the ick factor of sleeping with strange men while unconscious. Some need comfort and to appreciate her beauty, while others need to degrade her. Each man is different, and their treatment of her varies from tender to cruel. While they aren’t supposed to penetrate her, some of them cross the line by bruising her and burning her. These scenes are intentionally hard to watch. She is laid bare, and most of them are monsters.

Unfortunately, she gets a phone call from Birdmann one day that he had overdosed on pills. She gets to his apartment in time to find him nearly dead. He begs her to take off her shirt and hold him. She agrees, and the two share one final moment before he dies. She is heartbroken, and it is the only time Lucy shows emotion in Sleeping Beauty until the very end. This is very important in understanding the final scene. At his funeral, Lucy is reeling and asks an old boyfriend to marry her as a way to connect with a cherished memory of Birdmann. This goes as badly as expected, and she is rejected and ridiculed. She continues working for Clara and being her Sleeping Beauty, enduring indignities and injury.

On the train, she sees a sleeping woman and tenderly wipes her face and protects her as she sleeps. This demonstrates that Lucy understands that what is happening to her is not acceptable. She has not lost her humanity, regardless of her cold behavior. That night, she takes a drug offered to her by a coworker and has a wild night of sex and hallucinations. She is woken by the company requesting she come to the estate for a job. She takes her camera and is escorted out of her apartment by the driver, Thomas. Despite having one real night of passion she willingly chose, she returns to working as a Sleeping Beauty because she thinks she has no choice.

Before she is drugged again, she asks to see what happens in the room while she is sleeping one time, but Clara says it would violate her clients and refuses. She drinks the sleeping tea, later wakes, and places the camera in the room to capture what happens to her. The first man who said his bones were broken then drinks some of the same sleeping tea prepared by Clara and presumably dies shortly after. Clara comes into the bedroom the following day to find the man dead. She next realizes Lucy is unconscious and performs CPR to revive her. Clara does wake up and begins screaming in abject pain.

Maybe she screams because she realizes what she thought was a meaningful choice to be with Birdman as he died was yet another decision taken away from her. It became a commodity bought and sold to men who wanted to consume and abuse her. Losing the last true crucial memory and decision she felt she had in life, Lucy is broken and cries out in pain.

Another possible explanation is that Lucy intended to commit suicide to reclaim her power. She felt powerless throughout the film, with the ultimate violation happening when she should be the safest. After deducing she was being abused, losing Birdmann, and being rejected by her ex-boyfriend, Lucy loses all hope and decides to end her life. To her, it is her way out and the only way to take back what has been stolen from her. She intends to die in the bed along with the man, and when she realizes that Clara has resuscitated her, Lucy rages against the injustice.

The story of the first man who pays for her sleeping beauty services hints at this. In the story, a man has a series of life-changing events that cause him to realize what matters most. After telling the story, the man laments that he never learned the importance of enjoying life. He “carried on” until everyone was gone. This bony, weary man had enough of his life and wanted to die. He was tired of life and knew he had squandered it. The only question becomes: was Clara the changed man who unlocked all his feelings and finally understood what mattered, or was she the broken man with nothing left to live for?

Lucy goes along with everything because she feels she has no choice. She is supporting herself and her alcoholic mother. Her sister is selfish, and her only friend is profoundly depressed and committed suicide. She has managed to shut off her emotions, which allows her to be taken advantage of without destroying her soul. She thinks. Lucy doesn’t realize that just because she compartmentalized her emotions does not mean what was happening to her didn’t affect her. Her consent was not much different than Birdmann’s decision to slowly kill himself. His addiction controlled him, and she was controlled by restriction and apathy.

In the end, ignorance wasn’t bliss. Lucy may have been at peace when she was sleeping, but it was not a genuine peace. It was a synthetic, fragile peace that left her unsafe and traumatized. Whether she woke to find her attempt to end her life had failed or the true horror of what was happening to her hit her, Lucy is overcome with emotion.

Which explanation you agree with depends on your view of Lucy. If she was desperate and depressed enough to end her life, you think she is angry she failed. If you believe she was a terrified, shocked woman, she was finally coming to terms with what she suspected. The man dying next to her was the last straw. She willingly chose to climb in bed half naked with Birdmann because she cared for him and he for her. The men she had been sleeping next to didn’t care about her and, in some cases, hated her enough to hurt her.

Mostly, Sleeping Beauty is about human connection and kindness, and poor Lucy receives very little from anyone in her life. Her friend Birdmann called her needing her love selfishly. He didn’t think about what watching him die in her arms would do to her, and the clients only wanted to take from her. Respect and decency should be basic tenets of human interaction. However, Lucy only saw depravity, and it destroyed her. Sleeping Beauty is currently streaming on Tubi.