You’ll Never Guess Orphan’s Surprise Ending, Because It’s Ridiculous

@The Boulevard of Broken Queens: where is my dumb chauffeur?

@The Boulevard of Broken Queens: secret dwarf hooker, isn't it nice, luring disco dollies to a life of vice

So we sit through all this movie... to watch Baby Herman and his hooker Nurse, combined?

Who Framed Roger Rabbit, indeed....

pink_clerical_collar

@AuntPenny: DId anyone actually watch Sleepaway Camp..or just remembering the wesome Robot Chicken parody?

@My_Latest_Incarnation: The real plot twist is she's a Trans-gendered Evil Midget Hooker. Ha! Chuckie's back!

@dianashotko: I was expecting an unholy 3 way mating of "The Good Son" (remake of "The Bad Seed"), Omen (remake of well, "The Omen"), and "The House on Haunted Hill" (remake of every freakin' haunted house movie...ever). Evil Midget Hookers are a refreshing change from the usual crap movies and the crap Saw/Hostel sequels.

Did anyone else think this was a remake of "The Good Son" (Macauley Culkin, Elijah Wood)?

Regardless, still a dumb movie.

@18thCFox: except for when it IS.

labyrinthine IS DOING THIS

@ichigo18: I am both a fan of horror films *and* a film school graduate. I read spoilers all the time, and if someone actually cared enough about my work to talk about it before it was made public, I would be ecstatic no matter how much they gave away of the plot.

Also, since when is 33 middle aged? Are you 12?

But she doesn't have a penis, right? Like in Sleepaway Camp? Because that would be awesome. Sort of. Or not.

AuntPenny

Uh, wasn't Warner Bros that first thought of this gaff. It's in two Lon Chaney movies, silent and sound versions: The Unholy Three; Mike Maltese appropriated the idea for Baby Faced Finster.
Still, now I wish I'd seen it. With Harry Reid capitulating and G. Gordon Liddy not dead yet, I could use a laugh. And I'm sure Vera F. gives up a great wide-eyed reaction shot to the denouement.

regisgoat

@Novaload Misses Murilee:

No, I think they are called didgets.

miss_msry

holy fuck, my next screen name is SO going to be Secret Dwarf Hooker

MncinglyWhoredL'mer

@afraidofauntieem: It's never lupus.

I use to be terrified of midgets, dwarfs and jockeys. I mean to the point that I had to cross the street on the rare occasion a dwarf couple was walking towards me holding hands. Then, one day, at this restaurant where I worked a semi notorious sex-worker/ burlesque-dancer-little-person was seated in my section. I nearly had a panic attack but was already not getting along with management so I decided to suck it up and be professional. She turned out to be a lovely lady and the incident helped me overcome my fear of tiny tiny people. Though outside of the Wizard of Oz they still give me the minor willies (sorry little people).

pony_express

She just fucks the hell out of fellow midget Lou Dobbs for 90 seconds, on the starship Space.com ... then it is destroyed by Allah.

@ShubhangiLaterensis: I still have nightmares from when I watched that at age 10.

pony_express

The only thing that would make this more ridiculous is a kickstand.

OrneryBabe

@pepelicious: Uh, yes, my dear, that's what I was pointing out with my clumsy snark. Except using the reflect tool isn't creepy, it's lazy.

Occula

@lightupmyroom: They also had that episode where girl with the liver disorder looks like a ten year old elopes with a pedophile. It was when Stabler was dating the dutch chick.

@Miss Anita Manbadly: I thought she was some sort of asinine ghost of foster mommy's grand-mommy's aborted fetus who's come back for revenge on the her mother's descendants because she didn't get to live and she sees dead people have gypsy curses on them because there's a mermaid living in their boat shed...or something. Secret dwarf prostitutes are a huge improvement.

@It's twue! It's twue!: She's still a great big whore.

*sorry, I couldn't resist that*

Little Whores, Big World.

Senor_Macho_Solo

Apparently there no film students or horror movies fans on here. Sure, it's funny, but wouldn't you be pissed off that after working months or even years on a movie, that some moron gives away the ending online.

And come on that ending is pretty original if you ask me, how many of YOU would have thought to yourself "Hey, let's have the ending be a crazy, middle-aged little person who worked as a hooker!"

Maybe there'll be a twist, twist ending where she turns out to be the hooker from Total Recall:

ichigo18

@Steverino Begins: You know Steverino, I was looking all over for a good laugh today and now I have you to thank.
MWAH!

There's something wrong with Esther?

@TillieHarper: We the Blacks...Niggmata (I Have...: And this is why I try to keep quiet in the theater. I had a similar moment during The Village.

eleusiswalks

@lightupmyroom: I knew it! Thanks.

@metalkate: Me, too. Now I shall eagerly await the HBO/Showtime/Cinemax airing of this movie. This seems like the kind of movie best enjoyed with plenty of alcohol.

And just when I was saying to myself, 'Jesus friggin' Christ, not another creepy kid movie.'

OrneryBabe

@EastEndguy: Damn it, and I'd gone sixty-five years without spoilers!

ampersandparade

@eleusiswalks: That happened to me with the Sixth Sense.

I was in the theatre with a friend who'd dragged me to see it. As soon as Bruce Willis got shot, I said (quite loudly), "Oh, God. He's not going to be dead the whole time and not know it, is he?" She was crushed.

The audience was not happy either. I got one, "Aw, shit" and more than my fair share of popcorn tossed in my hair that night.

TillieHarper: We the Blacks...Niggmata (I Have Holes in My Soul)

@BrownSugar***s: Because it's there, and she can. That's why.

OrneryBabe

@God: You mean, finishing her quota of sex toy trucks. Whatever the hell that is.

OrneryBabe

@ShubhangiLaterensis: That was the first one he mentioned, actually. Then he was like 'also every horror comic from my childhood'.

eleusiswalks

Yep. It was even used in a pretty well-known Julie Christie/Donald Sutherland vehicle, Don't Look Now (1973).

ShubhangiLaterensis

In the interest of fair play, I will now spoil the endings of the two other major releases opening this weekend:

The Ugly Truth: men and women are different.

G-Force: your children will grow up to be stupid.

Yeah...I'm going with Orphan.

I will note that I was talking to my father, who loves B horror, and suggested we go see this movie together because I had found out Esther's secret and it was hilarious.

He said, and I quote: "She's not an evil dwarf, is she?"

He was joking. I made a face. Now he does not want to go. Apparently the evil dwarf twist was super common back in the day? He's like "of COURSE she's an evil dwarf, that is like every Creepy Comics resolution ever."

eleusiswalks

@skahammer: Agreed. If predictable were London, this would be Tokyo.

This is actually great. I win money on this. When first assaulted by the trailer my loved one rolled his eyes and groaned (as any decent person would, nay, should).

He lamented another movie with an evil, possessed child with black hair.

"No, no" I said. They want to be different. I flashed back to the horrible moment when the wife says Esther isn't who she pretends to be. I told my boyfriend at that moment that Esther wasn't "evil" in the Damien sense, but a grown-ass woman. To quote myself, "probably in her thirties." He glared at me, as if it to say, 'they wouldn't dare.' I just shook my head and said, "Yeah...bet." We shook on it.

My reward is dinner. It will be a bittersweet meal. How wonderfully awful.

TillieHarper: We the Blacks...Niggmata (I Have Holes in My Soul)

@Julio Esquivel: Which, by the way, was f'ing brilliant of you. This whole article and comments have got me laughing so hard that spit is coming out of my nose. Nothing to add except thank you Gawker. This is beautiful!

@Conchie Birdie: Yes! Except she wasn't a midget. She was just old.

http://www.recapist.com/2007/05/17/law-order-svu-5-15-2007-foster-imposter

lightupmyroom

@Julio Esquivel: If you have to explain it...

LeeMarvinsPants

@intime: i was definitely not going to see this movie, but if this is really the ending, now i'm kind of sorry that i didn't get to see it for myself unspoiled.

Still has a better ending than Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.

@Aaron Altman: Nah, cause then it would've been lupus

I'm predicting that "she was really an adult dwarven prostitute" is going to be the new ending for all movies now.

@Occula:They flipped one side of her face over and reversed it to create a perfectly symmetrical, and creepy, face.

@secretagentman: It's that not everyone gets a car.

Also, that wagon full of fat? You don't want to know whose it was.

@secretagentman: Friday induced dyslexia. Perfectly acceptable until you write "bitch" instead of "batch" in an e-mail to your boss. Last week's fun. Can't spellcheck evolve into "Does this make any damn sense in the sentence" check?

Had zero plans to see the movie until now. Ridiculous twist ending or best promotional idea everrrrr?

@TurdBlossom: Yeah, it's going to be really awkward going to see the movie when there's a crowd of dwarf hookers in front of the theater, waving tiny protest signs.

The preferred term is "little former prostitute".

So this movie is nothing but a longer House episode?

So apparently, what's wrong with Esther is that she can't take a joke by Randy Newman?

@eleusiswalks: I was just making a not-so-clever reference to the whole "birther" thing. I don't actually take this sort of thing seriously...

Julio Esquivel

@intime: Yeah. Wouldn't it just have been easier to find a roommate? Her weirdness sounds pretty standard for NY Craigslist.

SarahHeartburn

"Rosebud" was his sled.

EastEndguy

@secretagentman: I read the same thing

magic8ball

Thank you, Richard, for completing my Friday afternoon with this...SECRET DWARF WHOOOOOOOOOOOOOAR.

@badasscat: I've heard about it but never actually done it. In Victorian times people used to believe that each side of your face changed depending on emotional/negative experiences affecting certain lobes of your brain. Don't know how much truth there could be to that, but I'm going home to find a mirror and trying it myself!

That's the greatest muthafuckin' plot twist in the history of film. Buying my ticket right now.

@Julio Esquivel: I think you are overthinking this killer dwarf whore movie.

eleusiswalks

@secretagentman: Oprah's Favorite Things? NOT ACTUALLY HER FAVORITE THINGS.

I hear they recruited Teresa to flip a table at the end and scream "Dwarf prostitution WHORE!" Sent chills down the spines of test audiences.

Now I can't stop humming "Secret dwarf whore, that's who you are," to the tune of Atlantic Star's Secret Lover.

so they took a page from "Don't Look Now"?

Isn't a proportional dwarf a midget?

I thought the twist would be that she's made of Photoshop. Check out the poster. Loooook clooooose...

Occula

@eleusiswalks: I still say all she needs to do is present a valid form of previous orphanage residence and this whole thing will be cleared up in a matter of seconds. Not a form of "live orphanage residence," but an actual, valid form, released by the state. That's all it takes.

Julio Esquivel

I won't be able to sleep tonight with my killer dwarf child in the house. Thanks, Gawker.

@Julio Esquivel: Well I think she kills Sister CCH Pounder pretty quick into the movie, so maybe by the time it looks weird it is ~too late~.

eleusiswalks

its like th ehorro version of strangers with candy.

chip

@eleusiswalks: So she tricked the orphanage into believing she had been from orphanage to orphanage, huh? What a little scamp.

Though one would think the orphanage would research her history a tad bit more, unless, of course, her family forged her history so that, one day, she could successfully kill a random foster family.

Julio Esquivel

Great, now all of the 33-Year-Old-Former-Child-Looking-Hooker... Adoption Agencies are going to throw a fit because no one will want to adopt from them now.

o-line

I must have some mild form of dyslexia because at first glance I thought the header said " You'll Never Guess Oprah's Surprise Ending!". I was like, omg, she came out! Or she was born a man! She's actually really poor and just been f*cking with everyone!

secretagentman

I was convinced she was going to turn out to be Bill O'Reilly in drag, what with the sheer, unmitigated evil shit and stuff.

Oh well, I guess midget psycho-hooker is close enough.

@Mymoustache: Ohhh, how dare you beat me to posting this comment, you smarty smart, you! Good job.

She removes her makeup to reveal Dick Cheney. This is the "secret location" that he spent eight years in, and it was funded by this movie.

@Julio Esquivel: Apparently that scene is actually in reference to a -different- orphanage where Esther supposedly was before she was at the orphanage where Vera Farmiga + husband get her.

eleusiswalks

@thegreatfratsby: I figured that was too obvious, since she even -looks- like a girl Damien. She has all the old-timey clothes on and her name is Esther, I figured she was some dead kid from the gilded age or something.

eleusiswalks

I KNEW IT!!!! ever since the first trailer where they show her all dressed up in a woman's dress looking into the cracked mirror and in Fangoria magazine where they show her lookin like an woman bout to stab someone. it feels so good being right

@Mymoustache: If only.

eleusiswalks

This is absolutely amazing and I will absolutely go see it!

They gave away the spoiler on Slate a while ago.

Okay, so I've heard about the ending before and yeah, it's somewhat interesting...

But what I don't get is that, in the previews, they point out that the orphanage "all of a sudden" doesn't know who Esther was or anything, all this after giving her to the foster family. I mean, what, they just chose to ignore the fact that they housed a 33-year old proportional dwarf prostitute whom they gave away to an unsuspecting family? Oh wait.

Julio Esquivel

@eleusiswalks: and she reveals herself to be Billy Barty...she uncovers her neck to reveal her tracheotomy tube, and inhaling a cigarette deeply into the tube, patiently waits for a "john" to arrive...who bears a startling resemblance to jeffrey epstein. The end.

Mymoustache

Richard, I've noticed you have a penchant for using specific car references to add color to your stories, especially obscure marques and unloved heaps of yore. This makes me suspect you are a car guy, which I love, because who would guess that a snarky media elite living in Brooklyn would be a car guy at heart?

gabbo

@GretchenWieners (is finally done with his...: I thought that her head was attached by a ribbon, too. Ha. But of course, that would only happen in Florida. Or Germany.

mina324

@eleusiswalks: I thought she was the anti-Christ, myself.

thegreatfratsby

Actually, credit goes to Videogum--Gabe unearthed this comment a couple weeks ago: http://videogum.com/archives/movie-posters/the-orphan-poster-needs-more-t_078332.html

acroro

wait! could this be the big twist from Lost as well? Walt is really an old man dwarf???

AlgernonJibroni

@aedude01: But without promoting that there is a twist, I would've written it off as a basic suspense / horror / "The Good Son" re-tread. The twist actually makes it kind of interesting.


I'm curious how the internet will hurt (help?) movies with twist endings. The Sixth Sense came out when the internet was still fairly weak, so word couldn't travel as quickly. Technology advanced to allow the twist each subsequent M. Night flick to spread faster and faster. Now the twist is out before the movie hits theaters.

What's next? Writer posts the twist to his Twitter before submitting the script?

Steeb2er

Okay, now I have to see this, though, Secret Dwarf Hooker would have had me in a seat, too.

@bytememehard: Don't people have to be planning to see it for that to happen?

No. Really?

Apparently there's a neat scene where Esther removes her fake child-dentures and wipes off her pancake make-up and she actually looks like a dwarf (due to make-up or prosthetics or whatever, I dunno).

I don't think I'm gonna see it, but man this is a funny twist. Here I was, so jaded, yelling 'She's a GHOST, DUH' at the preview when it was all YOU SHALL NEVER GUESS HER SECRET.

eleusiswalks

@intime: She likes to kill moms and seduce dads.

No, really.

eleusiswalks

So basically, this is the tale of a renegade naughty Christmas elf who violated her contract and ran away from the North Pole before finishing her quota of toy trucks and blowjobs.

Now I'm a strong believer in punishing abnormal people for being abnormal. So I like parables like this one, where extremely short adults get what's coming and are finally made to realize that they're really weird.

@City_Dater: A 90-minute Pro Active commercial? I guess Jessica Simpson missed out on the opportunity of a lifetime yet again.

Caius

Totally called this a week ago when I actually gave the trailer some thought. I just said to myself...watch it be something like that perpetual child villian from the Batman animated series.

OldManOnTheHill

which esteemed ain't it cool commenter broke the story? was it danny glover's dickblood?

pkellen2313

@skahammer: I like it :) Here's a hint though studios: IT'S NOT A TWIST IF YOU ADVERTISE IT

aedude01

Warners Bros just stole an idea from a Looney Tunes cartoon.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3HQP2tVtC8o

Cam/ron

Secret dwarf hookers are a dime a dozen.

TabithaIapetus

Orphan = meh
Secret Dwarf Hooker = box office gold!

lionboy

Huh, I read this on IMDB this morning and called BS. Shows what I know. But seriously... haven't dwarf hookers suffered enough?

And why does she burn down the house? Political statement?

BrownSugar***s

Saw that coming a mile away, as soon as the trailer announced "a twist you'll never see coming".

Try again studios. Try again.

I thought her head was held on by a ribbon, like that girl my 7th grade best friend's brother's friend's second cousin in Florida used to date....

I swear to God guys! It happened.

Um, er....so why does a 33 year-old dwarf ex-hooker want to pretend that she is an adopted child?

I knew I wasn't going to see this movie - now I know for SURE I don't want to ever see this movie!

See, this is the movie The Sixth Sense could have been, if Haley Joel Osment have been replaced with Hervé Villechaize.

@SybilDisobedience: Have you ever tried this with a picture of yourself, or someone you know really well? It's like looking at a person you've never seen before. It's weird! It's amazing how asymetrical most of us really are.

!!!! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U6epnDpt0Qg&feature=related

jrhys

Sounds like a run-of-the-mill episode of House.

HOUSE (writing scripts on board): Let's see: orphan, no history, she grabbed Chase's dick, tested positive for syphillis-- (runs out of the room and pulls scarf from patient's neck). I knew it! She's a dwarf prostitute!

@City_Dater: Lindsay Lohan should take some notes. Seriously.

TurdBlossom

remember when that was the twist in Don't Look Now? Hollywood coming to the rescue one more time with fresh ideas half-remembered from watching TCM in a stupor.

SugitaAlcimede

And cue the countdown for the inevitable bitching from the dwarf community for not hiring a real midgit for the role in 5, 4, 3, 2...

TurdBlossom

Actually, she's not a prostitute at all. She's a serial killer who has already dispatched several families across Estonia after failing to seduce the patriarchs. Peter Sarsgaard is another notch on her bedpost.

SavitashriTexodus

@skahammer:

I'm with you on this. I got so tired of the supernatural shtick that this actually made the movie appealing to me. Not that I'd go see it. Rent it maybe/ Definitely watch it when it comes to tv.

The-Ohio-Player

I'm waiting for the usual suspects to start bitching about you ruining the movie for them, so I can tell them, once again, to spend the 90 minutes reading a book. Where are you, whiners?

@LucilleMcGillicuddy: Yeah, that stuff is still taboo. Although, the movie Feast's take on it is freaking hilarious.

TubOfTaft

@Private Hangnail: Sadly, try as she might, poor Bev can't manage to look under 50, though she is only 45 (allegedly).

@TubOfTaft: It
may interest you to know they shot this scenetwo ways, one in which she almost kills the
little boy and one in which she does kill him.
But they decided they couldn't kill a kid.

@Private Hangnail: Orphan: Prostitution whore, the story

pinkteapot

Oh GROSS

In the final scene, she reveals how she keeps her skin so unlined and 9-year-oldish, while Vera and Peter nod wisely and take notes.

City_Dater

The Orphan Society of America:
"Oh. Never Mind. Carry on."

Little People of America:
"Jeez. Seriously? WTF!?!"

Is this film version of The Danielle Staub Story?

Ha! She tooootaly did make this movie before with that stupid kid Lucas or whatev... But her hands down creepiest kid flick remains Running Scared. I watched that high and my head almost exploded.

There's something wrong with Esther's movie poster, since they just did on a mirror image of one side of her creepy little face, I guess because symmetrical little horror weirdos are more effective than asymmetrical ones?

@Conchie Birdie: yep just re-ran on the marathon on Sunday

Ah, so that's what Epstein's Florida Science Foundation is researching - induced dwarfism.

daveyjonesisdead

"Esther lights up a smoke and talks about the 80s and then drives off in an old Datsun. Hopefully." Is fuckin' brilliant!

But didn't the wayans brothers already do something like this?

Mymoustache

Another spoiler! She trys to kill the couple's son by smothering him with a pillow in his hospital bed. Oh, and the dwarf is trying to hook up with Peter Sarsgaard. Nasty!

TubOfTaft

I guess her Kevin Spacey-esque widow's peak should've given it away.

Didn't they have this on L&O:SVU once?

Dude, they have to have a flashback where she's on the street trying to pick johns up, and one pulls up and she can't see over the car door.

Actually that's a pretty good twist.