12 Controversial Movie Endings That Came Out Of Nowhere

4. Ben Is Mistaken For A Zombie - Night Of The Living Dead

Night Of The Living Dead, George A. Romero's classic, influential zombie flick, sees a group of survivors holed up in an old house as the undead begin to resurface in their endless search for brains. Over the course of a brutal night, a man named Ben (Duane Jones) and a woman named Barbra (Judith O'Dea) must deal with a whole variety of unsavoury characters - both of the living and dead variety - if they want to survive until dawn. At the end of the movie, though, Barbra is consumed by the zombie horde, leaving Ben as the only survivor. Then something terrible happens: Ben survives the night, but when he awakens, a posse mistake him for a zombie and shoot him dead. "That's another one for the fire," the gunman says casually, only adding further to the ending's bleakness. Ben being a black character, the sight of an unarmed African-American being shot by a white posse held a lot of racial commentary and thus invoked a lot of controversy. Of the ending, George A. Romero himself said: "Everyone wanted a Hollywood ending, but we stuck to our guns." No kidding, George.