‘A House of Dynamite’ cast opens up about film’s viral ambiguous conclusion

Kathryn Bigelow is back with a new political thriller, A House of Dynamite, produced and released by Netflix.

While the film made great strides in gathering acclaim since its debut at the Venice Film Festival earlier this year, its larger premiere on Netflix has thrusted it into public dialogue and everyone is talking about the same thing — the ending.

Focused on a fictional nuclear attack aimed at the United States, A House of Dynamite ends with an apparent explosion which is never confirmed.

Per ScreenRant, the conclusion “takes a major turn as it doesn’t reveal whether the missile successfully hits its target of Chicago.”

Speaking to the outlet about the ambiguous finish, the movie’s cast had as many varied reactions to share as the audiences currently do.

Idris Elba, who stars as the US President in the film, said, “Unfortunately, it is the sacrifice of having 10 million people die versus the entire planet would’ve probably been his decision. But I don’t know. I don’t know. We didn’t want to know the answer.”

While the leading lady, Rebecca Ferguson claimed that the uncertainty at the end is “one of the most amazing things” about the whole vehicle.

“And I think this is the thing that Kathryn keeps saying, ‘Is this the way to keep peace? Is a nuclear weapon the decision? Is that how we retaliate? Is it the fact that we should communicate the fact that we need to deescalate the nuclear warheads that we have around the world?’ I mean, it’s absurd that we think keeping peace is by nuclear weapons and nuclear war,” her answer revealed — also echoed by Jared Harris, who plays the American Secretary of Defense in the new release.

Harris said that “the fact that they’ve left that over to you to end the movie the way that you want to end the film in your own mind is the reason why there are conversations afterwards.”

Kathryn Bigelow’s A House of Dynamite initially premiered September 2, before opening in select theatres on October 3 (UK) and October 10 (US), and arrived on Netflix, October 24.