rising to heaven, descending to hell (film, scenes, crime, family)

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Many depictions of rising to heaven and descending to hell in motion pictures. A couple recently: Kore-eda Hirokazu's Still Walking and Stephen Frears The Grifters.

SPOILERS

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Still Walking

A man and his new wife and son make what turns out to be his last visit to see his parents. The entire film is of that day's visit. While the beginning scenes of his aging dad walking from his home down the hill to the beach (where we later learn his oldest son died saving a boy who was drowning) leads one to believe that this is the title sequence, though further on in the film his wife (the man's mother) plays the song Blue Light Yokohama, where part of the lyrics translate to Still Walking - and this is the title sequence. It's funny, because she plays it and the old man looks up and recognizes the song, but says nothing. Later, in a shot where he's in the tub, and she's outside, she tells him about it - that early in their marriage, she was outside his girlfriend's apartment with their first born baby on her back, and heard that song playing, and she goes out and buys it - and the expression on his face as he cringes - she knew about his affair for all of these years and he's only finding out now. At the end, when the son and family leave his parents, they are seen ascending the stairs and the son comments (subtitles in picture below).

Second recent film I just (re)watched: Stephen Frears; The Grifters.

Anjelica Huston, who plays John Cusack's mom, finds out his son is still leading a life of crime as a grifter - following in her footsteps. The ending scene is powerful and is not to be missed - Huston, who just accidentally on purpose smashes the fatal blow to her son and is on her hands and knees picking up the blood covered money that she means to steal from him, picks up the also bloody brief case where she stuffed the money (which is sticking out all over the sides), stands up abruptly and seems to step on him (you can see the body jolt) as he lies bleeding out, dying, and you can just see that he's still breathing, eyes open, minutes, if not seconds away from death. Then you see her descending in the elevator. At one point the camera, focused on Huston, follows her and descends toward the floor as she goes down, making her escape.