Summary

• The Killing of a Sacred Deer is a mysterious and unsettling film that requires multiple viewings to fully unravel its many layers and understand its enigmatic ending.
• The film explores themes of revenge, justice, and twisted power dynamics, with Steven, a heart surgeon, being forced to make an impossible choice by Martin, the son of a deceased patient.
• The title of the film, "The Killing of a Sacred Deer," comes from a Greek myth and serves as a clue to understanding the ambiguous finale and the central themes of guilt and responsibility. The movie's unique dialogue and strange moments contribute to its unsettling and psychological horror atmosphere.

Many viewers may be left looking to see the ending of The Killing Of A Sacred Deer explained due to the film's enigmatic nature. Yorgos Lanthimos has already earned a reputation for his distinct, unsettling filmmaking style. The Killing Of A Sacred Deer is among the strangest of his movies though, and even when its ties to Greek mythology are explained, it has many layers that require multiple viewing to unravel. In The Killing Of A Sacred Deer, heart surgeon Steven is seemingly cursed by the son of a deceased patient, who first infiltrates his life and family before seeking some karmic justice for what happened to his father.

The Killing Of A Sacred Deer stars Colin Farrell as Steven and a compelling Barry Keoghan as Martin, the unreadable teen who sets about dismantling his life until Steven makes an impossible choice. It's clear from the offset through The Killing Of A Sacred Deer's strange dialogue that it won't be a narrative with a straightforward or happy ending, with events escalating around the film's midway point. Martin tells Steven that to balance out his father's death, Steven must choose one of his own family to kill before The Killing Of A Sacred Deer ends.

What Happens In The Killing Of A Sacred Deer Ending

The Final Scenes In The Unsettling Horror Movie Explained

At the ending of The Killing Of A Sacred Deer, Martin gives Steven a tough choice. If he refuses to kill a member of his family, they will each suffer through different stages of illness, like paralysis or bleeding from the eyes, before death. The movie sees Steven become increasingly desperate as his son Bob and daughter Kim fall ill with these myriad symptoms, ultimately leading to him and his wife Anna (Nicole Kidman) debating the impossible choice of killing one of their children. The Killing Of A Sacred Deer ends with Steven tying up his family when Bob starts bleeding from the eyes — the last stage before death.

Steven then blindfolds himself and spins around with a rifle, firing randomly, so he doesn't have to make a choice. This eventually results in Bob dying, and The Killing Of A Sacred Deer's ending scene has the family seated at dinner sometime later. Martin comes in and stares at them from the counter, and they all get up and leave, with each taking turns to look at Martin, highlighting the unworthy nature of his sacrifice (as he did not choose which child to offer). It's a dark and dread-inducing movie throughout, but the depth of The Killing Of A Sacred Deer ending is difficult to fully appreciate during the initial viewing.

What The Ending Of The Killing Of A Sacred Deer Really Means

The Title Gives Many Clues About The Truth Behind The Ambiguous Finale

The Killing Of A Sacred Deer can be explained by its title, which comes from the Greek myth of Iphigenia, a daughter of King Agamemnon. When the latter kills a sacred deer belonging to goddess Artemis, in the Greek myth that inspired Sacred Deer, he is told to sacrifice Iphigenia to make things right. This story is referenced in the film itself, with director Yorgos Lanthimos being anything but shy about the central thesis of his own tale. Throughout the movie, there is also a running theme of the family pretending everything is fine — even when it clearly isn't.

Steven never takes responsibility for his actions. This is typified by the death of Martin's father, which may well have been an accident, but the fact that Steven had been drinking on the day of the operation muddies the waters of responsibility. Much like the original Greek tale, The Killing Of A Sacred Deer is a story that explores the question of guilt when evil acts are required to write a perceived wrong.

The Killing Of A Sacred Deer’s Strange Dialogue And Reactions Explained

The Unique Script Style Conveys The Movie's Narrative Themes

The Killing of a Sacred Deer features offbeat dialogue coupled with bizarre emotional reactions, but it's purposeful. It elevates the movie from a regular drama to psychological horror, and the dialogue choices are incredibly narrative-focused. Each line of dialogue heightens the tension and lays the chilling nature and themes of the movie bare. The choice of wording packs more emotional heft into Steven and Martin's dealings and overall relationship, explaining The Killing of a Sacred Deer's ending and its impact. It's designed to make the plot of the A24 horror movie unsettling, and it does so successfully.

The strange turn of events, like Martin trying to set Steven up with his mother despite being married already, is punctuated by this asynchronous speech, which adds more color to the situation. Another strange moment happens when Kim dispassionately tells her father that Bob is dying. Cold moments of interaction like this are what justify the difficult decision that Steven must make at the end of The Killing of a Sacred Deer. The movie would display fewer interesting psychological horror/thriller elements without the seemingly bizarre dialogue.

How Director Yorgos Lanthimos Explained The Killing Of A Sacred Deer

The Director Has His Own Interpretation Of The Ending

The Killing Of A Sacred Deer ending left viewers with many questions. It's a strange movie by all accounts, but this is to be expected from director Yorgo Lanthimos. Many of his movies, from The Lobster to Killing Of A Sacred Deer all explore complex themes with unsettling quasi-body-horror elements. While this means that he's gained a following for his cerebral and thought-provoking movies, it also means the meaning gets lost on some viewers who appreciate the quality of the film but still don't quite understand what The Killing Of A Sacred Deer was trying to convey — or even exactly what happened by the chilling ending.

Fortunately, the director has been open in interviews about his interpretation of the story. Speaking to The Atlantic in 2017, Yorgos Lanthimos explained The Killing Of A Sacred Deer's ending and the core themes of the movie from his perspective. The director revealed where the idea for Killing Of A Sacred Deer came from.

"The initial thoughts were around the oddity of a very young person (Martin) trying to get revenge over something an older person has done. And that kind of dynamic, that a teenager can actually terrorize someone grown-up and mature... And, also, the themes of justice and the ambiguity of the situation we choose to put [Farrell’s] character in. He’s a doctor, and whether or not there was any fault, that kind of ambiguity, leading into impossible questions and dilemmas."

The movie is, at its core, about revenge, justice, and twisted power dynamics, according to the director, and the ambiguity and uncertainty of Killing Of A Sacred Deer is clearly integral to this. The strangeness of the movie was also deliberate and important to Lanthimos, from the cinematography to the dialogue. Much of what made The Killing Of A Sacred Deer such an endeavor to dissect was a masterful way of delivering an emotional response to the audience once the director's intentions are understood:

"The way we thought about this story, it seemed it would take place in the normal world; well, the world that we know. [Laughs.] I don’t know that it’s normal, but the world that we live in. Within this world that we’re familiar with, something odd and otherworldly happens. So it was important that it felt like the real world, so that the situation did seem extreme and strange and impossible to deal with.

​​Was The Killing Of A Sacred Deer Too Weird?

The Yorgos Lanthimos Walks The Line Between Disturbing And Confusing

The Killing of a Sacred Deer received a generally positive response from critics, including an 80% Rotten Tomatoes score and the award for best screenplay at the Cannes Film Festival, but some of the general audience was confused or turned off by the film. Lanthimos' style of movies may be closer to experimental and arthouse directors like David Lynch than even "prestige horror" creators such as Ari Aster or Jordan Peele, creating a disconnect with audience expectations due to the movie being marketed as a more straightforward A24 horror film.

The Killing of a Sacred Deer also doesn't explain explicitly why such a curse has befallen Steven's family, or how Martin is connected to it, instead operating in a purely symbolic fashion. The Killing of a Sacred Deer uses its stiff dialogue and unusual plot to create a very distinct and unnerving atmosphere, but it's understandable if some audiences may feel it's just too weird for them. However, for viewers seeking a movie that reveals something new about itself with each consecutive viewing, The Killing Of A Sacred Deer is one of the best choices out there.