I’m thrilled to announce that I’m up for two Aurora Awards this year! Fireboy is on the ballot for Best Young Adult Novel, and The Worldshapers is once again on the ballot for Best Fan …
I spent a good chunk of today at Wordbridge, the annual writers’ conference in Lethbridge, Alberta. My main reason for coming was to launch a Shadowpaw Press title (Broken Realm by Jenna Greene, a Lethbridge …
This is Easter weekend; last weekend, I sang in the Easter concert of First Baptist Church here in Regina as a guest soloist and chorister. The whole concert is worth listening to, but if you’d …
I put a link to this in the previous post on my Aurora-eligible work for 2025, but wanted to highlight it. This was my contribution to the Shapers of Worlds Volume V anthology, and it …
The Aurora Awards are Canada’s best-known science fiction and fantasy awards, voted on by fans every year. I’ve been fortunate enough to win twice, for Marseguro (DAW Books) (soon coming out in a new edition from Tuscany …
Put this under the category of “things I’ve meant to do for a long time”: I finally published (under my Endless Sky Books imprint) a new edition of The Haunted Horn, a modern-day middle-grade ghost …
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A defense of "hokey" endings
I’ve been enjoying Andrew Breitbart’s new BigHollywood group blog very much, and liked this quote, from John Nolte’s commentary on the Alfred Hitchcock film Notorious, in which he takes issue with those who think its ending is “hokey”:
“Hokey” isn’t the result of a story point, “hokey” is the result of the execution of the story point, something “Notorious” proves definitively.
Why have we allowed ourselves to buy into the idea that uplifting endings are old-fashioned and “hokey?” Nihilism may never be hokey, but it sure can be lazy. Ending a film on a downer and calling it complicated and nuanced requires almost no work compared to crafting a climax that lifts the human spirit.
“Notorious” ends on an emotional triumph that requires a genius for mature filmmaking that’s all but vanished. Irony and nihilism have their place but too often they’re a refuge for mediocrity.
I think his points apply equally well to fiction. High school students trying to be deep write ironic stories with nihilistic endings. Mature writers should be capable of more.
Permanent link to this article: https://edwardwillett.com/2009/01/a-defense-of-hokey-endings/
