Editor’s Note: This article contains spoilers for the end of Leave the World Behind.
Sam Esmail’sLeave the World Behindofficially hit Netflix, bringing a feature film adaptation ofRumaan Alam’s novel of the same name to life. The book centers on a group of people trying to survive a cyberattack in a remote home in Long Island, NY. While most page-to-screen adaptations take creative liberties,Esmail’s vision of the story changed one especially key part of Alam’s original work: the ending. Though reactions to Esmail’s ending have been especially strong, and not entirely positive, Esmail knew early on that he would change what happens.
During an interview withCollider’s Editor-in-ChiefSteve Weintraub, Esmail explained how he arrived at his version of the ending forLeave the World Behind. He shared that upon a second reading of Alam’s book, he began “to picture all of the elements that I would change,” including the cyberattack itself and a few aspects of Rose (Farrah Mackenzie). Notably, Esmail pulled outaFriendsmention in the book and made it an integral part of Rose’s character, ultimately building towards a “perfect way to end the film” as Rose was able to watch theFriendsseries finale rather than reunite with her family. In the book, Rose’s intentions to return to the others are a little more clear than where Esmail ends the film.
Additionally, Esmail knew thatLeave the World Behind"couldn’t pull punches, meaningI knew that they weren’t gonna overcome the disaster. That felt wrong to this story." He reiterated thatthe story is foremost about the characters, but he still needed a win:
“The whole story was really about these characters and their reconciling their differences within themselves, but maybe at a moment that’s too late. I wanted to really commit to that, but at the same time, I wanted a victory that, for me, would feel satisfying. I felt this was the way to get both where I could embrace the ambiguity of, ‘Where does the world go from here for these characters,’ which I think is really potent and true to life, but by the same token, I wanted a victory for, to me, the heart of the film, which was Rose.”
Rose Is the Core of ‘Leave the World Behind’
Esmail continued to stress thatRose is the “emotional connection” ofLeave the World Behind, a major reason whyhe wanted the ending to focus on her specific accomplishmentof finding and watching theFriendsfinale episode. He explained that although some have criticized him for being “cynical about Rose and that I was being condescending,” he believes the opposite. Esmail further reiterated that Rose chooses to act in a way the others won’t, something she tells her mother (Julia Roberts) the night before she disappears. He explained:
“Rose, to me, was my emotional connection to the filmbecause she’s the one that’s really, out of all of them, not spinning their wheels. She wants to move forward. That was the whole point about the parable that she shares with her mother the night before, is that she doesn’t want to ignore the warning signs anymore, she wants to figure a way out of this, and so I thought it was very sweet to end on her victory.”
Leave the World Behindis streaming now on Netflix, stay tuned at Collider for our full conversation with Esmail.
Leave the World Behind
A family’s getaway to a luxurious rental home takes an ominous turn when a cyberattack knocks out their devices, and two strangers appear at their door.
Watch on Netflix
