How did the film Talk to Me actually end? Plot summary, meaning of the film, explanation of the ending, similar movies.
Country: Australia, UK
Genre: horror
Year of production: 2022
Director: Danny Philippou, Michael Philippou
Actors: Sophie Wilde, Alexandra Jensen, Joe Bird, Miranda Otto
Danny and Michael Philippou’s eerie film explores the tragic consequences of not letting go of the past. Its unusual and interesting plot makes many people talk about a breakthrough in the genre. However, the ambiguous ending of the film Talk to Me is controversial.
Plot of the film Talk to Me
Brief description of the contents of the picture. The plot centers on a young girl named Mia. One day, along with her friend Jade and her younger brother Riley, she finds a group chat on the Internet and watches a crowd of teenagers perform an ancient ritual. The guys film everything that happens on smartphones and post it on social networks.
The role of Mia was played by Sophie Wilde. Still from the film.
The eerie meaning of the ritual is to call lost souls into our world. However, the guys don’t take this seriously – for them it’s just fun at a party. To make contact with otherworldly forces, a person needs to touch a special embalmed hand and say: “Talk to me.”
A friend playfully tells Mia that the guys are going to have a session again and invites her to go. But the girl doesn’t particularly like this idea: the day of the party falls on the anniversary of the death of her mother, who died under very strange circumstances. However, after thinking carefully, she makes up her mind. Moreover, it seems to her that the anniversary is a great occasion to contact her mother, talk to her and find out what happened to her.
Joss and Hayley, the guys doing this ritual, don’t look like professionals. However, they warn Mia that contact with spirits is quite extreme: not all of them are kind and at any moment something can go wrong. But Mia is already “on fire” and ready for anything.
The guys review the rules of the ritual and report that it will only last 90 seconds. In particular, to talk to the spirit, you need to light a candle, shake the dead hand and say a passphrase. After this, you need to put out the candle, otherwise the otherworldly guest will not want to leave the world of the living… Miya does everything according to the instructions and in the end her mother gets in touch. Not wanting to say goodbye to her so soon, she exceeds the time limit and an evil spirit appears on the scene. No one has time to really get scared, because Joss and Hayley break off the connection.
However, Mia is happy. She does not even suspect how dangerous this “childish prank” is – after all, after each such ritual, the thin line of the worlds is destroyed and, as a result, spirits penetrate into the material world.
Still from the film.
The next day the girl wants to repeat the session. She goes to her friend and asks her to invite Hayley and Joss over. Jade agrees, but categorically forbids Riley from participating in the session. However, when she leaves the room, Mia invites him to join. She contacts her mother again and once again exceeds the limit.
Meanwhile, evil spirits enter our world and take over Riley’s mind. He, trying to commit suicide, hits his face on the table. The shocked guys stop the session, which no longer makes any sense, and help the young man who is in critical condition. He is sent to the hospital, and Jade attacks her friend with reproaches: if it weren’t for her, none of this would have happened.
A little later, Miya decides to continue. Having stolen a magical hand, she plunges deeper and deeper into the dangerous world of spirits. Now Mia sees her mother everywhere and she hints to the girl that she should help Riley – the teenager, still possessed by spirits, tried to commit suicide several times, even while in the hospital. Mia is seriously thinking: how to do this? After all, Jade and her family still don’t want anything to do with her…
A little later, Mia meets with her father Max, who initiates her into the secret of her mother’s death – she committed suicide. And then the spirit of the mother contacts the girl and tells her that Max is lying. At this moment, the father, having burst into the room in which the “session” is taking place, for no apparent reason attacks her and she, in defense, stabs him in the neck with scissors. But in reality, her father did not intend to harm her – it was a hallucination. However, Mia doesn’t care anymore.
Towards the end, she becomes completely obsessed with “helping” Riley. To do this, she kidnaps him from the hospital almost in front of Jade, who does not have time to stop her.
The spirit of the mother, trying to convince the girl to push the guy in the wheelchair under the car, says that after this he will “stay with them forever.” After this, Mia finally understands that her real mother would never push her to kill. Realizing that all this time she was under the power of some evil spirit, the girl moves away from the chair. A frightened Jade rushes towards them. She pushes her friend, and the next moment Mia gets hit by a car.
Talk to Me Ending explained
Explanation of the ending of the picture. After this, the girl returns to the hospital and watches as the recovered Riley leaves home with her family, and her father gets into the elevator. Mia tries to attract their attention, but no one seems to notice her.
The answer is that she died and became a spirit herself. Realizing this, the girl slowly plunges into darkness. After this, she approaches the embalmed hand and one of the participants in the seance says that he let her in.
The meaning of the ending of Talk to Me! is probably that Mia became one of the “lost spirits” – like many other people who died a “bad” death. She didn’t just die tragically – her death occurred at the moment when she was possessed. Thus, Mia will now wander in the darkness and occasionally communicate with the living who are organizing a seance. What kind of spirit she became – good or evil – is unclear.
Max’s fate is also unclear. On the one hand, Mia couldn’t talk to him, which means he’s alive. But there is another interpretation: he died after being wounded in the neck. Not forgiving his daughter for his own death and not wanting to talk to her, he quickly pressed the button of the heavenly (hospital) elevator…
Zoe Terakes as Hayley. Still from the film.
The meaning of the film Talk to Me
Talk to Me is an interesting adaptation of classic stories about the other world. If seances were moved to one of the gloomy estates of, for example, West Lancashire, and modern teenagers were dressed in Victorian costumes, the difference with the style of Edgar Allan Poe or Mary Shelley might not be noticed.
Domestic localizers, as usual, named the picture in their own way. But the title “Two, three, demon, come!” – this is absolutely “about nothing”. In the original, the film is called “Talk to Me” and this has a special, hidden meaning. The main character Mia lost her mother. For her, a seance is not a game or fun, but an opportunity to contact a loved one. It doesn’t matter how and when, no matter what consequences it may lead to, the most important thing is to feel him nearby, at least for a short time…
Some viewers compare Talk to Me with “Astral” and “Ouija Board”. However, this picture is much deeper. Despite the fact that the film was made not by a professional director, but by young Australian blogger brothers, it turned out to be strong and genre-defining.
It’s easy to see the similarities between this film and the folklore story of the 17th and 18th centuries about a man mourning a dead man who eventually comes and tries to take him away with him – something similar happens here.
Communicating with the dead is not child’s play. In the pre-Christian era, this was done exclusively by professionals – shamans. And after the adoption of Christianity, this became completely obscene: according to this teaching, the dead are dead and are very far away. Completely different entities get in touch with lovers of spiritualistic seances.
Still from the film.
“Talk to Me” is positioned as a horror film. However, it is not frightening, but rather disturbing. Because here, even in the presence of evil ghosts, first of all it is said that the most terrible demons always hide inside us and only our personal fears can cause them “from the other side.” After all, it was the deeply traumatized nature of the main character, who was never able to come to terms with the loss, that became the catalyst for the troubles that befell the people close to her. The girl’s thoughtless desire to contact her mother and find out what really happened to her allowed otherworldly predators to have fun in our world…
But the essence of the film lies not only in this. The Philippou brothers touch on very important topics here regarding the “buzzer” generation. In particular, they talk about how dangerous addiction to social networks and the desire to be on the wave of trends are. Thanks to all this, the picture turned out to be bright and original.
Not long ago, information appeared that a second part was coming (which is not surprising given the ending, which seems to hint at a continuation). It is unknown whether she will answer the questions first, but it is quite possible that we are watching the birth of an interesting new franchise.
Still from the film.
Similar films
Here are several films similar in meaning and plot to the film Talk to Me:
- “Silent Hill” (Canada, France, Japan, USA, 2006). Young Sharon constantly pronounces the name of the city in her sleep – Silent Hill. The girl’s mother decides to go on a risky journey with her.
- “Candyman” (USA, UK, 1992). Maniac Candyman is a character from an urban legend. A group of young scientists decides to check its authenticity.
- “The House on the Other Side” (UK, USA, 2020). An inconsolable widow is sorting through her husband’s belongings. She soon realizes that he had secrets from her.
- “The Conjuring” (USA, 2013). The Warrens are detectives who investigate cases related to mysticism. One day the Perrons turn to them for help, claiming that evil spirits are rampaging through their house.
