Was anyone not satisfied with the ending?

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Should they kill Eden Fletcher, it would leave a plot gap.

How could they even know that somehow Fletcher was the most responsible for Mikey's whipping that lead to his death? All they know or they think they know is Stanley is the one behind that. And in the end that Charlie redeemed both Stanley and his wife and shot his own brother instead make the ending somehow extraordinary and unlike Hollywood usual cliche. which is a relief...

threads like this are very telling of the average mind, or lack of mind, of the typical male adult. always trying to work the just-world fallacy into every event, real or fictional.

civil society is destroyed, lives are irreparably ruined, and the bad guys are offed only after the damage has been done. who cares about fletcher? and the whipping of mike is a joke of emotional manipulation. family raped and murdered, but lets feel sorry for the whipping of the perpetrator.

hey, if a family under my charge was tortured raped and killed, and one of the perpetrators was in my custody, i'd stomp him to death. mike got off easy. there's something wrong with you if you think otherwise.

This film was entirely unsatisfying except for the extraordinairy performance by the most gifted actress of our time, Ms. Emily Watson. Her artistry gave life to a banal script and overcame the lackluster efforts of the director and fellow cast members. She deserved another Oscar nomination for her brilliant work in this motion picture and in recognition of her genius for making any film tolerable simply by the power of her presence. This woman's stunning talent is only surpassed by her sublime loveliness, artistic integrity, and unwavering dedication to her craft. All this is obvious to those who truly love cinema and are familiar with Emily Watson's overwhelmingly impressive body of work.

I think it would've been too unrealistic if Fletcher had been killed. Under the caste system, the *beep* always fell to the bottom. Eden Fletcher, given his exalted status within the town, would've been untouchable, more or less. Peasants certainly wouldn't have even thought to question his authority. And the fact that Stanley did would've been quite a rogue act for the time.

Consider, throughout the movie it is said that Mrs. Stanley married down, as if Morris was beneath her. That's because he occupied a lower rung on the social ladder due to his birth. It wasn't because of his character or merit, it was simply the luck of the draw. The larger message there is it's the peons who get pissed on; the little guy takes the fall. Stanley gets what Fletcher deserved, much like a medieval prince's whipping boy. And, what really drives the point home is even a man as fiercely independent as Stanley was powerless in the face of Fletcher. Even though he knew it was a death sentence for him, he ultimately had to follow protocol, and respect Fletcher's authority.

This may seem absurd to us, but it was a code that was strictly adhered to back then. There is a saying within the Hindu caste system, "A 100 year old Kshatriya should respect a 10 year Brahmin like he respects his own father". Kshatriyas are only one notch below Brahmins on the totem pole, but as you can see, that didn't matter. In the British caste system, even if a noble was wrong, you had to follow his orders (you didn't have to, technically, but your "honor" depended on it). And it was considered punishment enough for a noble's reputation to have been tarnished. So, even though Fletcher survived, and Stanley, in all likelihood, died from his wounds, Fletcher would've been disgraced for failing to civilize his town, at which point, he probably would've been shamed into boarding a luxury-liner bound for his lordly manner back in England, where he would've been forced to live out the remainder of his days in opulence and luxury, but without his honor.

And as for the ending itself, I thought it was incredibly well written. It gave me chills when Arthur asked, "What are you going to do now" and Charlie didn't reply. The ambiguity was perfect.

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It would have been really nice if they had killed Eden Fletcher