10 Movies That Judged You At The End

Woody Allen's 1980 dramedy Stardust Memories stars Allen himself as filmmaker Sandy Bates, whose comedy movies have been hugely successful, yet has had his attempts to branch out into more dramatic fare be stonewalled by studio executives who want him to stick to more commercial fare.

Near the end of the film, Bates' reality begins to dissolve, as he hallucinates figures from both his movies and his life. This culminates in a final scene where his visions are shown to have been watched by a film audience, who applaud and then get up to leave the cinema once it's over.

Allen then lingers on the audience as they discuss what they've just watched, many of them over-intellectualising the work, as is very clearly a mockery of Allen's own highfalutin fans.

In one hilarious beat, an audience member asks their friend, "What do you think the significance of the Rolls-Royce was?," to which their friend replies, "I think it represents his car."

Another character can then be heard asking, "From this he makes a living?," before Bates himself appears in the empty cinema, grabs his glasses, and walks off.

While Allen has maintained over the years that Stardust Memories isn't autobiographical, it's a tough claim to believe given how blatantly Bates' story reflects Allen's own.

After all, following the release of his Oscar-winning hit comedy Annie Hall, Allen's first foray into straight drama, Interiors, received a more cool reception from audiences and executives, who simply wanted him to produce another crowd-pleasing comedy.

Whether he admits it or not, Stardust Memories is clearly Allen venting his frustration with Hollywood and the fickle tastes of audiences. Ironically, this movie itself was a box office flop.