Ethan Hawke Reveals His Interpretation Of First Reformed's Ambiguous Ending

Ethan Hawke shares his interpretation of First Reformed‘s ambiguous ending seven years later. Written and directed by Paul Schrader, known for penning Martin Scorsese’s Taxi Driver (1976) and Raging Bull (1980), the 2017 film features an ambiguous ending regarding the fate of Ethan Hawke’s Reverend Ernst Toller.

During a recent appearance on Vanity Fair‘s video series in which actors break down their careers, Ethan Hawke shared his interpretation of First Reformed‘s ambiguous ending. The actor explains that it’s meant to express the film’s idea that wisdom holds two opposing truths at once. The final shot embodies this “continuity of opposites” – life and death, reality and illusion, symbol and experience.

Hawke believes explaining it would diminish its power. He emphasizes Paul Schrader’s deliberate choice of this ending, saying it functions like a bell. The point isn’t its sound, but the resonating questions and reflections it leaves within the viewer. Read Hawke’s full explanation or watch the portion of the video below:

I know some things about it that I’m not sure are helpful to say, but I think that ending is a cinematic expression of a thought that is articulated earlier in the film, was that wisdom is holding two opposing thoughts at the same time. And that shot is an attempt at the continuity of opposites, like, how do you express it? It’s real, it’s not real. He’s dead. He’s finding life for the first time. It’s a symbol. So to answer it is to rob it of its power. The thing that I know is how much thought Paul put into that, and that I read multiple drafts with multiple endings, and I watched him arrive at that as the right ending. And I found it incredibly satisfying, it does exactly what Paul, even if you don’t like it, it’s doing what he wants to do. So it’s fine. And I know Paul has said before that, “A great movie starts as you walk out of the theater after it was over.” A great film should be like a bell, and it’s not the ringing of the bell that’s important. It’s the vibration and what it awakens in you that’s significant. And so the end of that movie is a bell ringing, and it’s designed to walk you out of the theater thinking about the themes of the film, rather than finishing a story.

First Reformed stars Ethan Hawke as Reverend Ernst Toller, the minister of a small congregation in upstate New York whose life begins to unravel following an encounter with an unstable environmental activist and his pregnant wife, Mary, played by Oscar nominee Amanda Seyfried (Mank). Cedric the Entertainer, Victoria Hill, and Philip Ettinger also star.

First Reformed‘s ending is intentionally ambiguous, leaving viewers to interpret what happens to Reverend Toller. Just as he is about to drink a glass of drain cleaner, Mary interrupts him, and they passionately kiss before the film abruptly cuts to black. The ending can be interpreted in a few different ways: Either a miracle has occurred and Toller is saved, or it is a dying man’s vision as he drinks the drain cleaner.

Paul Schrader, who received his first Oscar nomination for writing First Reformed, intended for the ending to be interpreted in two different ways: “One, that a miracle has occurred, and his life is spared. The other is equally, in my sense, optimistic, which is that he drinks the Drano, and he’s on all fours. He’s throwing up his stomach, and God comes over to him.”