With Alice, Darling now streaming on Hulu, a new swath of fans are taking in its shocking ending and revelatory lake dive.
The 2022 thriller from director Alanna Francis stars Pitch Perfect's Anna Kendrick as Alice, a young woman who takes a much-needed girls' trip to escape a psychologically abusive relationship with her boyfriend, Simon.
The film was lauded upon release, earning a stellar 84% on Rotten Tomatoes. It joins Kendrick's long resume of acclaimed movie hits, including her 2024 directorial debut, Woman of the Hour, which takes a few pages from Alice, Darling's book but has its own shocking ending.
What Does the Alice, Darling Ending Mean?
Audiences have long wondered what happened during the Alice, Darling movie's ending and what the final lake dive means.
Starring Anna Kendrick (who can next be seen in the upcoming Accountant 2 with Ben Affleck), Alice Darling focuses on the Pitch Perfect actress as the unassuming Alice. Alice, in her mid-20s at the time of the film, has spent the last few years of her life in a psychologically abusive relationship with her boyfriend, Simon (played by Charlie Carrick).
In the years since Simon and Alice started dating, he has become increasingly overbearing on Kendrick's young professional, stripping her of just about anything outside their relationship. This includes her close friends, Tess (played by LetterKenny's Kaniehtiio Horn) and Sophie (Wunmi Mosaku), who have become concerned for Alice.
Let's Take a Girl's Trip
As Alice and Simon become closer, Tess and Sophie grow more concerned for their friend, suspecting something may be up between them. Although Tess set the pair up in the first place, she becomes suspicious of Simon and fears the worst.
This causes Tess and Sophie to invite Alice for a night on the town, which Simon surprisingly agrees to. However, while out for a drink, Alice is noticeably skittish. Her eyes dart to her phone constantly, and she is never mentally present with her friends.
The girls notice this and invite her on a weekend girls' trip to hopefully learn more about Alice and Simon's situation. Alice agrees to go but does not tell Simon. Instead, she lies to her potentially abusive boyfriend, telling him she is going on a work trip.
On this trip, the ball begins to roll toward Alice, Darling's jaw-dropping ending.
I Need To Save that Girl
While away at a remote cabin, Alice attempts to distract herself from the fear of Simon discovering her lie. To do this, she becomes involved in a missing persons case and joins the search for a young girl, Andrea.
This causes her to (for the most part) disconnect with Simon, something Sophie and Tess seem enthusiastic about, as the pair of friends begin to fully understand how bad it had gotten between Alice and Simon.
There are moments where she dips back into the fear of her boyfriend finding out where she is, but they are few and far between. A significant moment occurs when the nerves encroach on Anna Kendrick's character as she paddles boarding across the lake where their cabin is situated.
As she paddles around the tranquil setting, Alice accidentally loses her balance, which causes her to tumble into the water. As she emerges, she notices one of her earrings, a gift from Simon, is missing, and she must find it.
Thurst by intense anxiety, Alice embarks on a frantic dash through the water as she tries to find the missing piece of jewelry. She does not prevail, though, as she never finds the earring.
A Tense Dinner & Alice's Last Stand
Everything culminates with Simon discovering the truth behind Alice's trip away, forcing him to travel to the cabin where the three girls are staying to, hopefully, pick up and bring home his (at least for now) girlfriend.
While Alice seems to have made progress and is perhaps starting to envision a life without Simon, his appearance at their front door shockingly causes her to agree to go with him.
After a tense dinner, in which Simon reveals they found Andrea's dead body, and one final night together with Sophie and Tess, Alice and Simon pack up her things and hop in the car to go home.
This makes it seem as though, despite everything that has happened, Alice may never escape Simon's clutches, and her friends can do nothing about it. However, she eventually has her 'come to Jesus' moment.
As Simon's car gets stopped at a crossing with a pack of cyclists, Sophie and Tess catch up and smash the vehicle's rear window. Alice signals to Sophie that she does not want to go, and Wunmi Mosaku's (who can also be seen as B-15 in Loki Season 2) character pulls her friend from the car.
This prompts one final stand-off with the women, as Simon demands that Alice come with him. In a culminating act of defiance, she declines, and he tosses her possessions at the side of the road.
Diving Into the Lake
The movie then ends with another paddle-boarding scene. Alice is out on the lake again, drifting along the top of the water. Like last time, she dives into the water but comes up easily, taking one final breath before it cuts to black.
This final breath seems to signify that Alice has finally let go of Simon and is no longer afraid of her former lover. Learning Andrea's fate seems to have clicked something in Alice's brain during that final dinner scene with Simon and her friends.
Discovering that the girl she had been hoping to find was gone shocked Alice into a reality check.
It was almost as if Alice was using the act of finding Andrea as a way to find herself. However, when she was taken off the board, Kendrick's character realized that if she continued dating Simon, she could end up just like Andrea.
Alice, Darling is streaming on Hulu in the U.S.
