The best movies have the craziest plot lines and the most insane twists and turns. From Sixth Sense to Reservoir Dogs, the impact these movies made lasted way after viewers left the theater. Read on to find out the most iconic movie plot twists ever put on the big screen. Warning: major spoilers ahead!
Reservoir Dogs
Quentin Tarantino had audiences on the edge of their seats for this crazy switcheroo movie. The viewer is led to believe Mr. Orange is part of the heist, but find out in the end that he’s actually an undercover cop. The craziest part is that they knew the whole time!
Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back
When Luke Skywalker goes to defeat Darth Vadar, he learns he has to take down a villain he never expected: his own father. It’s a moment that defined an entire franchise.
The Crying Game
Back in the day, people weren’t as open-minded about LGBTQ issues and experiences, so it came as quite a shock when this movie revealed the character Dil to be transgender. The movie changes the focus to surrounding this moment of exposition.
Audition
Audition surprised audiences when the young girl was meeting up with older men for dates. It really shocked viewers though when she was revealed to be a terrifying killer out for revenge.
Oldboy
Oh-Dae-Su learns the truth about his captor and about himself. The woman he had slept with wasn’t a stranger, but rather his very own daughter. In one of film’s most uncomfortable moments, this twist is both creepy and so perfect to blow you away.
Vertigo
Vertigo has a pretty complex plot, but in the end, audiences learned the truth. Judy and Madeline might look, sound, and act differently, but they’ve been the same person this whole time!
Chinatown
“She’s my sister and my daughter” is simple enough dialogue to describe this plot twist.
Memento
Leonard spends the entirety of this movie trying to piece together the memories that led to his beloved wife’s death. He woke up with amnesia and in prison, but in the end, we learn that it was Leonard himself who killed the wife.
Scream
This masked villain got his reputation for slashing, but the biggest twist of this blockbuster wasn’t who was behind the mask, but who was behind the death. Though Billy dies early on, he comes back and reveals that he and Stu had been the killers together the whole time.
Les Diaboliques
The viewer is led to believe that they are being told a ghost story. However, in the end, we learned that Vera is manipulated into a heart attack. This wasn’t a ghost story, but a murder story.
Citizen Kane
“Rosebud” is a simple word that carries so much weight in this film. It’s the journalist’s last words before he dies, a clear reference to his childhood sled. He had a little heart in him after all.
Friday the 13th
Jason Voorhees died in the chaos that happened at Camp Crystal Lake, and his mother wanted revenge. Mrs. Voorhees was behind the mask the whole time and wanted the counselors to pay for not taking care of her son. Thankfully, one of them stopped her reign of terror.
The Game
The Game was all a game. Conrad and Nicholas were both alive the whole time, it was just an extensive activity to prevent Nick from becoming just like his dad.
Fallen
Azazel isn’t dead, but he isn’t really alive. When Hobbes kills himself to defeat him, he doesn’t know that Azazel inhabits a cat’s body, and then Hobbes’. Azazel was the voiceover!
Donnie Darko
This film has gained fame over the years. Though Donnie presumably is going to die in the apocalypse, he instead wakes up at the movies beginning only to die by plane crash moments later.
Secret Window
Mort is the secret killer in this flick. His dissociative disorder makes it so the shooter and Mort seem like two different people, but it’s just him. He kills his wife when she comes to divorce him. He also kills her lover.
Se7en
Brad Pitt was the one who coined the iconic and mocked phrase “What’s in the box?” Audiences then discover that it’s Paltrow’s head sitting inside. The movie has sat with viewers many years later.
The Parallax View
While reporting on a Senator, things get a little hairy for Warren Beatty. He realizes that he’s being framed for the Senator’s murder the whole time!
Primal Fear
Edward Norton plays this unique and interesting character. It’s revealed at the end that he wasn’t insane at all, and he faked it so that he could get the ending he wanted.
The Orphanage
Laura is overwrought with guilt when she realizes what led to her son’s death. She commits suicide because of how badly she feels.
The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari
This spooky flick is a confusing tale of ups and downs, twists and turns, ins and outs. It turns out everything was made up by a man stuck inside an insane asylum. Each character is another asylum patient.
No Way Out
Kevin Costner was secretly a mole for the KGB. The viewers learn that he was the real traitor the whole time.
Twelve Monkeys
Time travel movies can be tricky, and this one is no exception. We learn that as a child, he saw himself die as an adult. Don’t get it? Me neither.
The Wizard of Oz
The Wizard of Oz is a timeless classic. Viewers learn along with Dorthy that the Wizard wasn’t magical and possessed no special power. Celebrities, they’re just like us!
The Vanishing
The man is buried alive by his girlfriend’s killer in an effort to understand her life and death more. He succeeded, living the same life up to his eventual death.
The Wicker Man
A pompous policeman looks into the inner workings of a rumored cult. He learns too late that he’s going to be the sacrificed virgin to the cult’s god. Too little, too late…
Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?
George and Martha are enjoying a nice night outside when they realize their shared and terrifying truth. Their son doesn’t exist at all, he’s a mutually enforced delusion of the mind.
Open Your Eyes
This crazy movie follows a man who was dead the whole time, but that’s not all! He paid for a life extension package in this alternate reality where companies can sell consciousness. Wow!
The Sting
Bromance originated with Redford and Newman in this 1973 flick, change y mind. The boys discover that there’s a rat on the inside of the operation. They shocked the FBI and the audience alike!
Kill List
The Hunchback is the son but also the wife? If you can figure this one out, let me know. Ben Wheatley did not need to do that much, but he did.
Witness For the Prosecution
Leonard was the real killer in the did-they-didn’t-they movie. The surprise? no surprises!
Don’t Look Now
Donald Sutherland spends the movie convinced he is seeing his daughter, but it turns out to be a dwarf out to kill. Strange, but effective plot twist
Jacob’s Ladder
Who doesn’t like a “He was dead the whole time!” kind of plot twist? Well, Jacob’s later is a twist on this twist, as he’s still alive on the operating table. He’s unraveling in front of the audience at the end of his life.
Frailty
The son and brother of some serial killers, Matthew McConaughey delivers quite the performance. Spoiler alert: Matthew plays Adam, not Fenton. He also can see demons and kills the agent at the end of the film.
Soylent Green
The famous quote “Soylent Green is people!” speaks more truth than you want. Soylent Green is a product made of human parts, not kelp.
The Secret in Their Eyes
Morales knows who the killer is, but this film goes deeper than that. He also has the man held captive in a cell in the countryside for the past couple of decades.
The Others
Grace was the ghost the whole time. She killed her children and also herself. Ghost movie lovers never saw this one coming, but neither did Grace!
Snowpiercer
Outside of the train, all life was gone, or was it? The ending shows a polar bear, healthy and alive. They stayed on the train for 15 years for nothing and could have left at any time.
The Mist
The army shows up a minute too late in this film. The Mist ends when David seemingly saves the people from painful deaths by killing them all, but once everyone is dead, they’re saved. Too late…
Gone Girl
Amy frames Nick for her murder and plans to live a simple life away from him in the country. She reveals her plan halfway through the movie, tricking readers and viewers.
Gone Girl (again)
The even crazier plot twist comes at the very end when Amy returns and the couple pretends to get back together. Nick stays to protect his unborn child from Amy’s wrath, and Amy to retain her image.
The Sixth Sense
Malcolm Crowe’s wife barely looked at him, barely acknowledged him, barely paid him any attention. The reason isn’t obvious until the very end when we find out he was dead the entire time.
Lone Star
Sam and Pilar meet and fall in love, but in the end, you wish they never did. It’s revealed that they’re actually related. Who knew the skeleton would be the least upsetting part of this movie?
Inside Man
This film is narrated from inside a prison cell, or is it? The viewer is led to believe the story is about the robbery gone wrong, but find out that he’s in a secret room in the bank. He leaves out the front door with all the money.
The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance
Jimmy Stewart provides a unique look at the American experience. He wants to kill the outlaw, but Doniphon was the one all along. They keep the secret to protect their mutual love interest.
Unbreakable
You might think this movie is a thriller, but a surprise! It’s actually a superhero origin story. Mr. Glass engineered all the terrible moments to find a worthy superhero.
A Tale of Two Sisters
Su-mi is worried about her mother. She thinks she’s going to kill her and her sister. Here’s the twist though, both the mom and sister are figments of her imagination. Her mother was killed by a ghost and her sister was already dead.
Shutter Island
Sure, he might seem like a US Marshal, but in reality, this Leonardo DiCaprio character has been inside an insane asylum the entire film. A classic for a reason.
The Village
Deep in the forest, there exists a secret village of people who are living together to stay safe from humanoid monsters. We learn at the end that the monsters are just normal people, and the Village is all for nothing.
Get Out
Chris Washington meets his girlfriend’s weird parents and wants to leave the house. However, he discovers that black people’s bodies are being harvested for white people’s consciousness.
The Usual Suspects
One by one, the men die off until only Roger ‘Verbal’ Kint is left standing. As Kint leaves the police investigation, the officer realizes at the same time as the viewers that Verbal was actually Keyser Soze the entire time.
Ex Machina
Ava is an AI robot who could very well pass for a real human woman. She and Caleb form a connection, or so we’re led to believe. Eventually, she traps Caleb and escapes, making it clear she was heartless all along.
Orphan
This nine-year-old should be happy to be adopted, except there’s one big problem. She’s not a nin-year-old. She’s 33 and has a growth disorder. The wanted murderer takes off her mask and the viewers learn what’s really going on.
The Prestige
This twist comes at the revelation that Angier comes to– Borden isn’t one man. He’s twins doing the act. Angier had several clones and the original was drowned.
Murder on the Orient Express
This Agatha Christie adaptation is full of twists and turns, and not just on the train tracks! The killer wasn’t one member of the ride, but everyone. Edward Ratchett had hurt them all in some way, so they all helped in taking him down.
Atonement
This flick comes with one of the more tragic twists. Robbie and Cecilia were actually never together at all. The story picks up after their deaths during the war, and Briony is a writer who gave them a story they never lived.
Seven Pounds
Will Smith isn’t just a celebrity online, he also shines in this thriller. He reveals himself as the killer who murdered seven people while he was texting and driving.
American Psycho
Patrick visits Paul expecting to see a room full of blood and gore from a killing spree, but it turns out to be completely clean. American Psycho is one of the craziest killer stories of all time!
Everything, Everything
This film made teens everywhere feel the love between Maddy and Olly. It turns out though that they didn’t need to be apart. Her mother lied to Maddy about her allergy to the sun. They could have been together the whole time.
Fight Club
Tyler Durden is the lacky to the protagonist, until the very end. It turns out that Tyler and the depressed man are the same people, and he was the one conducting the fight club the entire movie.
Coco
Coco might be a kid’s movie, but it can still shock you. At the end of the film, Ernesto is revealed to be the one who killed Hector, and Hector is really Coco’s great grandfather.
The Uninvited
Anna’s sister was dead for several years, as the flashbacks reveal. Everything following was in her head, all their interactions were figments of a hallucination.
The Shawshank Redemption
Andy escapes with only a spoon in a twist no one saw coming. On his way on the run, he reveals that he’s writing from an island, living the life he always dreamed of. He escaped!
Saw
The game of saw goes on for the whole movie, but did you realize that the body in the corner wasn’t dead at all? It was Jigsaw himself, watching the game from inside the room. The sequels never lived up to the original.
Goodnight Mommy
Elias’ brother, Lukas, might be a handful, but here’s the thing: he’s not real. Lukas was never real, just a figment of Elias’s imagination.
Now You See Me
Dylan is never far away from the four horsemen, and that’s probably for the best. He orchestrated everything, the heist, the chaos, all of it. Welcome to the Eye…
Interstellar
In Interstellar, Mann kills off Cooper to protect himself. He also lied about the planet’s ability to sustain human life, and it’s actually unfit.
Perks of Being A Wallflower
Perks of Being a Wallflower defied the traditional teen movie by having a shocking twist ending. The main character, Charlie, is actually writing the letters to overcome his trauma of abuse by his aunt. He’s repressed it the whole time.
The Departed
This deadly ending won’t be forgotten. Colin is almost out of the woods until Sean Dignam reappears to end him for good. The movie finishes on this drastic scene.
The Boy
The movie got bad reviews, but the plot twist is still good. The doll, Brahms, is based on the dead child. Except he’s not dead, he’s been living in the walls the whole time! He survived the fire and has lingered ever since.
Whiplash
Andrew couldn’t live up to the excessive demands of his drum instructor, and during the drum recital, he completely misses the mark. His teacher ambushes him by giving him the wrong sheet music, but Andrew overcomes anyway!
Black Swan
Nina goes out to perform Swan lake after stabbing Lily, but she learns that Lily was just a hallucination. She actually stabbed herself and dies onstage in what was her best performance yet.
Toy Story 2
These franchise friends have a secret traitor among them, and it’s the kind-hearted old man, Stinky Pete. He prevents Woody and the rest of the team from leaving the collector’s room.
The Visit
Grandma’s house just got a lot more upsetting. Mom comes on the screen to say hi to the kids, only to see the grandparents and reveal that she doesn’t know who they are. They’re in the house with murderous strangers!
Psycho
One of the most infamous flicks of all time, Psycho tells the story of Norman Bates and his mother. Viewers learn that the mother is dead, and Norman has been pretending to be her by dressing up in her clothes. Her body is kept in the house.
Mystic River
Dave takes the blame for Katie’s untimely murder, but he didn’t do it. Jimmy killed Dave for no reason.
Planet of the Apes
Taylor walks on the beach, wondering how things could have come to this, a planet of apes. He falls to the ground when he sees the Statue of Liberty, halfway in the sand. The movie takes place millions of years after a nuclear war in America.
Harry Potter
Snape, though he was annoying for a majority of the series, turns out to be a good guy in the end. He was secretly protecting Harry and his friends the whole series.