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"Stonehenge! We had a time getting it here. You wouldn’t believe
how we did it!"
— Conal Cochran, Halloween III: Season of the Witch

Unreveals in Live-Action Films.

General examples:

2:37: We never find out why Kelly committed suicide.

This is the point of the movie; we see that the six
viewpoint characters all had reason to do so, but
since we don't get to see things from Kelly's
perspective, we don't understand what drove her to
end her life.
12 Angry Men is a famous example, since the plot
revolves around a murder trial that we see entirely
from the perspective of the jury. From the pieces of
disparate information that the jurors piece together,
we come to the conclusion that it's possible that the
defendant is innocent, but the movie abruptly ends
when the jurors come to a consensus and go home.
Since we never get the perspectives of the police,
the accused, or anyone else connected to the case,
we never get any clear answers about whether or not
the defendant really murdered his father (or about
who else might have been responsible if he is
innocent).

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As infuriating as this approach might sound, it

works very well as an illustration of what jurors
have to go through in Real Life, since they're
often forced to draw conclusions about cases
based solely on the limited information given to
them by lawyers and police, with no definite
answers either way. Yes, it's just as uncertain as it
sounds, but it's how the American justice system
works.
Not to mention that it's consistent with the
presumption of innocence. The prosecution has to
prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, while the
defense doesn't have to prove anything (and a
prosecutor even implying that the defendant has
to prove their innocence is enough to get a
mistrial declared, despite what many courtroom
dramas show). As long as the jury is unconvinced
of the defendant's guilt, then the prosecution has
failed to meet its burden of proof and the
defendant goes free. There's a ton of stuff that
Twelve Angry Men gets wrong about the judicial
process for the sake of drama (jurors are not
supposed to consider evidence not introduced in
court or to conduct their own
investigations/experiments), but it got this
essential principle right.

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The ABCs of Death: The killer's face in the "R"

segment is never shown.
In Ace High, the heroes have just finished a gunfight
with one of the protagonist Cacopoulos' enemies
Drake. Cacopoulos taunts Drake, and then says "My
grandfather used to say..." before fainting on the
casino floor.

The Big Lebowski: Did Walter and The Dude ever

make it to the Finals in that bowling tournament that
they spent a big chunk of the movie competing in?
The credits roll right before they start their Semifinal
game, so we never get to find out.
Bird Box: The exact appearance and nature of the
creatures is never shown.
Did the five teenagers in The Breakfast Club stay
friends, or did they drift back to their respective
cliques when they had to go back to school? It's
discussed late in the film, with Brian and Allison
apparently eager to maintain the group's newfound
friendship, while the others remain uncertain about
whether it will work. Then the credits roll just as
they're going home after Saturday detention, leaving
the question open to interpretation.

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In The Cable Guy, the verdict of the Sweet murder

trial is almost revealed but cut when Chip Douglas
lands on the satellite knocking out cable.

In most existing prints of Casino Royale (1954)note ,

we get the following: Le Chiffre is shown groping for
his hat—then the show ends. It had previously been
mentioned that he kept a razor hidden there. In the
rare prints that retain the full ending, Le Chiffre
threatens Valerie with the razor and is shot dead by
Bond.
In A Christmas Carol (1938), Scrooge extinguishes
the Ghost of Christmas Past before she can show
him "the darker years of his life".
Cloverfield goes through the entire movie without
revealing what the origins of the monster are, or even
if three of the main characters ultimately survive.
According to Word of God, the monster was a
baby that had been dormant at the bottom of the
ocean near an oil rig. The thing that you see
falling in the last scene is apparently a satellite
that wakes Clover up. Cue scared baby monster
tantrum.
Crank: High Voltage has the contents of Johnny
Vang's cooler. When Chev looks in it, he's disgusted
and tells Vang he has some serious problems.
In C.S.A.: The Confederate States of America, it's
never revealed what a 'negative' test means in the
context of the movie, therefore it's never learned
whether Horace's claims that John Ambrose
Fauntroy V has black ancestry were true or not.
Cthulhu (2007). The movie ends with the protagonist
implored to "Make sacrifice!" by the Big Bad (e.g. kill
his lover and become leader of the cult); the movie
ends before showing us his decision. Also, we never
see the Half-Human Hybrid offspring of the
protagonist in the bathtub. Which is probably just as
well.
The Cube film series:
In Cube, the people trapped inside the Cube
constantly speculate where the cube is, who
might have built it and why. The movie ends just
as the last survivor has found the exit. In an
additional Downer Ending twist, he's the Idiot
Savant who'd be unable to explain to anyone else
what he discovered.
The Hypercube in Cube 2: Hypercube seems like
it might be a bit more practical since it can
apparently fit in one room in physical space, but
only as a prison for an Eldritch Abomination, or
something of similar order.
In Cube Zero, the mystery of the Cube is
explained somewhat, with it being revealed to be
a secret government project. Still, what anyone
would want with an entirely useless, extremely
expensive machine like the Cube is impossible to
know.
This, of course, could itself be another
unreveal, as the twist is that even the people
who think they're just monitoring the cube are
brainwashed into forgetting they're prisoners,
too. Ultimately, only one character is even
implied to know the truth, and he's clearly an
Unreliable Narrator at best.
Played straight in the opening scene of Desperado in
which El Mariachi's face continues to be obscured by
shadows just when it looks as if it's going to be
illuminated. It's then immediately subverted in the
next scene when we see his face clearly and it turns
out the previous scene was a story his buddy
contrived to boost his legend.
Dragonheart begins this trope when the dragon tries
to tell the hero his name, but gets interrupted before
he can start.
The made-for-TV Spielberg thriller Duel never shows
the crazed trucker's face.
In Enemy, the exact nature of Adam/Anthony's being
doubles is never explained (many fan theories exist).
The Field Guide to Evil: The true form of the King in
"Palace of Horrors". Gentry sees it and Goes Mad
From the Revelation. Henry only sees the King in
shadow and goes mad for several months. The
audience doesn't really see anything beyond vague
hints.
In Forrest Gump, Gump's speech about Vietnam at
the huge protest rally on the Mall in Washington, DC
is left unheard due to a sound system failure—all we
hear is him saying at the end, "and that's all I have to
say about that." Though this did not "unreveal" a
major pivotal point of the plot, it still might have been
interesting to hear what this character would have
said about it. Possibly the writers attempting to cover
their ass, due to the divisive nature of the Vietnam
issue among the Baby Boomers to whom this film is
a sort of anthem.
A "making of" feature showed one take of Tom
Hanks doing the line read, with Gump giving a
short speech about his experience to the effect of
"In Vietnam, your best friend can get shot, and
your Lieutenant could lose his legs."
In The Good, the Bad, the Weird, we never find out
what Do-won (the Good) wants to do with the
treasure if there is proof that it exists. He almost
explains it to temporary partner Tae-goo (the Weird)
when they're bunking down for the night, but Tae-goo
decides he isn't interested and has already fallen
asleep before Do-won gets around to explaining his
motives.
In the Grindhouse movie Planet Terror, leading
badass El Wray has a mysterious past that accounts
for his remarkable skill with knives and firearms.
During the plot, the mystery is revealed.
Unfortunately the relevant scenes take place in the
never-filmed "missing reel".
In Halloween III: Season of the Witch, Conal Cochran
never explains how Silver Shamrock was able to
steal and transport a piece of Stonehenge itself
entirely undetected, teasing it as an unbelievable
story.
At the end of Halo 4: Forward Unto Dawn, after Kelly
and Frederick remove their helmets to show that
they're about the same age as the cadets they have
just rescued, everyone (including Kelly and
Frederick) looks at the Master Chief to see if he'll do
the same... and he simply turns away from them and
grips his weapon.
In Hardcore Henry, the antagonist Akan has Psychic
Powers which he uses to throw Henry around like a
ragdoll. How he got them, or whether other people
might have them, is never elaborated on.
The original Highlander does this with the nature of
the immortals. We’re never given a reason why some
people are granted immortality and forced into this
competition, they just are. When asked about it,
Ramirez flat out says that nobody knows and nobody
will ever know, so there’s no point in trying to solve
the mystery. The sequels tried to subvert this and
give an explanation, which quickly proved to be a
bad idea.
At the very end of Inception we see Cobb go home
to his children, finally see their faces, and supposedly
finally have a happy ending. That is, until we see his
top spinning and spinning and starting to wobble...
credits.
James Bond: In Casino Royale (2006), M comes
home to find Bond sitting in her living room...
M: How did you find out where I live?
Bond: Same way I found out your name. I always thought M
was a randomly assigned initial, I had no idea it stood for...
M: Utter one more syllable and I'll have you killed.

Originally, in-universe, it was a randomly assigned

letter, but when Ian Fleming was young he would
often call his mother "M", so he may have chosen
it for that reason. He also knew a man named
Maxwell Knight, who was the head of MI5 and
signed his letters with a single M.
A Freeze-Frame Bonus in Skyfall reveals that it's
Olivia Mansfield.
A plot point in Jeepers Creepers 3 is that anyone
who touches the Creeper's severed hand (cut off
during his previous rampage 23 years earlier) is
granted visions that apparently explain his origins
and true nature. Despite several characters getting
this knowledge, by the end of the movie it's not
shared with the audience. Presumably, it's left up in
the air as part of the movie's Sequel Hook.
In John Doe: Vigilante, the audience never does get
to hear the verdict in John Doe's trial. The Minister is
about to announce when he is interrupted by an
explosion in the crowd that marks the start of S4D
breaking John Doe out.
Possibly the earliest "MacGuffin case" is the one
containing the "Great Whatzit" in Kiss Me Deadly. All
we see is that it gives off a blindingly bright glow
(possibly nuclear in origin); the briefcase in Pulp
Fiction is speculated by many to be a Shout-Out to
this.
K-PAX: Is prot an alien, or just some guy suffering
from mental illness? There’s a lot of evidence for
both answers, and every time it looks like the film will
have a solid answer, a new question arises.
Kung Pow! Enter the Fist. The One-Boobed chick's
relationship to the Chosen One will be revealed in
the sequel.
The protagonist's name in Layer Cake goes
unmentioned for the whole film. At the end, just
before he is shot dead on his front steps, he
addresses the camera directly and teases us with the
possibility of mentioning it: "My name? To know that,
you'd have to be as clever as me."
At the end of Lost in Translation, Bob whispers
something into Charlotte's ear just before they part
ways. The movie then ends without the audience
knowing what was said. It can be assumed that it has
something to do with whether or not they plan on
getting back together, but that too is never revealed.
In Mamma Mia!, we never find out which of the three
men is Sophie's father and by the end of the film,
Sophie eventually decides that she doesn't care
since all three men are happy being 1/3 of her father.
Word of God does reveal that Bill is her father.
The "Rabbit's Foot" from Mission: Impossible III.
They even mention in-universe that it's a MacGuffin
and it doesn't matter what it is exactly. That we know
that it is powerful (it has a biohazard label on the
container) is enough to know.
In Monsters, it’s never revealed whether the
protagonists survive the giant alien attack and
subsequent airstrike.
My Cousin Rachel: We never do find out the answer
to the central mystery, whether Rachel really did kill
her husband and whether or not she was poisoning
Phillip. Phillip's last line of dialogue has him saying
"Were you innocent, or were you guilty? Rachel my
torment."
In the film version of The Neverending Story, Bastian
chooses his mother's name to give to the ailing
Childlike Empress. What is it? Nobody knows; when
he dramatically calls it out, it can't be heard over the
storm. (In the book, he names her "Moon Child".)
In the film, he actually does say "Moon Child", but
due to his voice being so high pitched when he
screams it, combined with the storm, unless you
knew that's what he said, you'd never be able to
tell.
In the movie, there's absolutely no way to
understand what "moon child" could mean.
Earlier, Bastian muses about calling the empress
by his mother's name, but we never find out what
that name is, and it wouldn't make sense for her
name to be Moon Child—so the scene seems like
a red herring.
In Tarantino's Once Upona Timein Hollywood, the
plot builts tension around whether Brad Pitt's
character killed his wife or not. We never get an
answer.
The contents of the briefcase from Pulp Fiction. All
we know is that it glows and "It's beautiful." The
original script had the briefcase simply contain
diamonds, but Quentin Tarantino decided to change
it at the last second to make it more ambiguous. He
ultimately regretted putting the lightbulb in the case,
since that was too leading. Ultimately the case is just
a MacGuffin.
Quarantine is very much in the same style as
Cloverfield. Near the end of the film, after we have
been fed tantalizing hints about the origin of the
virus, our protagonists stumble upon a hidden room,
full of newspaper clippings, pseudo-scientific reports,
and an old recorder. They fire it up, only for it to play
so slowly as to be unintelligible. Now, it's probable
that it actually says something (again, like the
message at the end of Cloverfield) but it's pretty
frustrating for the audience.
Thanks to various dedicated individuals and the
internet, there's at least one answer , for the
viewers, anyway. Too bad it's still just as
confusing.
Rashomon never gives a solid answer about the
circumstances of the samurai’s murder. Everyone
questioned (except maybe the Woodcutter) give
blatantly biased accounts and there isn’t any physical
evidence. It briefly seems like the Woodcutter’s story
is definitely the true one... but then, it turns out that
he was the one who stole the pearl dagger, throwing
his testimony into doubt. The movie ends shortly
after, with the characters more uncertain than ever.
[REC] does reveal the origin of the virus, but the fate
of Angela is still up in the air, with strong implications
that she's either dead or infected. In the sequel,
REC 2, you will get the answer: infected, but of
another kind... she is now possessed by the devil
entity
The contents of the car trunk in Repo Man. A similar
blindingly-bright glow is seen radiating from it
whenever somebody opens the trunk and is
disintegrated. An alleged photo of the contents is
shown on a tabloid newspaper, but is far too blurred
and ambiguous to be recognizable.
The contents of the case in Rōnin. All we know is
that governments want it badly. Even some of the
people fighting over it don't know the contents.
Being unmasked is the greatest humiliation a
Masked Luchador can face. So the wise luchador
hero takes precautions, like El Santo in El Santo vs.
the Martian Invasion. When a nefarious Martian rudo
removes El Santo's mask, he discovers that the
Crazy-Prepared luchador wore a second mask
underneath that one!
Shaun of the Dead played with this trope to
emphasize the disinterest the main characters have
in the situation. Several hints are given to various
origin of the Zombie Apocalypse — a space shuttle
exploding over England and showering debris, and
GM crops being "to blame" for something on a
newspaper headline, to name but a few. Finally,
Shaun is watching the news report at the end of the
episode. The announcer cheerfully reads, "We now
know the outbreak was caused by large amounts of
—" and Shaun changes the channel. A brief snippet
is also heard on the TV saying, "Theories that the
infection was caused by rage-infected monkeys have
now been dismissed as bollo--"
In The Social Network, did Erica Albright accept
Mark's friend request? at the end of the film? Also, to
a lesser degree, who is the "movie star" whom the
lawyers mention as having studied in Harvard at the
time? It's Natalie Portman.
If it helps anyone sleep better, the real Erica
Albright claimed that never happened in real life.
Star Wars:
In The Force Awakens Maz Kanata never tells
how she managed to obtain Luke's lightsaber.
The Last Jedi leaves Snoke's origins, motivations,
and ultimate plan completely unknown as he's
unexpectedly killed by Kylo before he has a
chance to reveal anything. However, the next
chapter of the trilogy reveals that he was a sort of
puppet made by Emperor Palpatine.
The Rise of Skywalker also has a plot point where
Finn attempts to tell Rey something as the group
were being sucked by a quicksand, before he was
drowned inside the pit. This was brought up by a
few characters later on, but Finn refuses to give
an answer (presumably it was a Not-So-Final
Confession of some sort), and then the whole
issue was abruptly dropped. Subverted in that the
novelization released months later reveals what it
really was: Finn found out at some point prior that
he was force-sensitive and wanted Rey to train
him. This makes sense as Finn's connection to
the Force was hinted at during the final battle
when he could sense Rey's (brief) death.
In The Strangers, the title characters terrorize a
couple while wearing masks. At the end of the movie,
before they kill the couple, they remove their masks,
but the camera cuts away before we get to see any
of their faces.
The Usual Suspects might be a very rare case of
inversion: we get to learn the identity of the weapons
truck robber at the time when both audience and
characters had forgotten a long time ago that it did
happen at all.
In Who Framed Roger Rabbit, we never find out what
Judge Doom looks like underneath the disguise.
Winter Kills: We never learn who the woman on the
bike is, or how she factored into the conspiracy.
Word of God has said she was meant to be Nick's
guardian angel, but admitted it wasn't made clear
enough.

Sound-Effect Bleep:

In the first half of Kill Bill, The Bride's real name is in

fact drowned out by a loud noise every time
someone says it. Though observant viewers can see
it printed on her plane ticket (twice).
However, her name is actually said in the first
lines of the film, but no-one realizes this until the
second movie. Bill calls her Kiddo throughout, and
her name is Beatrix Kiddo.

End of Movie Cutoff:

In Fast Five, when Tego and Rico are at the roulette

table after the heist, they each bet their entire ten
million—one on red, the other on black. They are
bickering about it as the table spins, and they look
down as it comes to a stop, before cutting away.
Even more so, the last frame of the scene is the
ball bouncing around the Zero pocket of the
wheel. To those unfamiliar with Roulette, the Zero
pocket is green, meaning neither would win, and
considering their tailored suits, the fact they were
in a high-class hotel in
MONACO
they have probably spent the first million of their
11 million dollar cut of the heist, so losing that 10
million is going to break one of the brothers. Note:
Notice the last few seconds of the scene, the
wheel is moving and the ball is bouncing rather
vigorously, it is unlikely the ball was going to land
on the green Zero, but still, must have been a
massive Oh, Crap! moment for the brothers.
In The Italian Job (1969), the characters find
themselves in a literal cliffhanger, in a bus that's
precariously balanced on the edge of a cliff. Michael
Caine announces, "Hang on, lads, I've got a great
idea!" The end credits sadly prevent us from finding
out what that is.
The cliffhanger would have been resolved in a
sequel: helicopters would be used to save the
bus, and the grateful gang would soon discover
that it is the Mafia that has saved them, and the
sequel would have been about stealing the gold
bullion back from them. Unfortunately, the sequel
was never made.
Michael Caine in an interview said something
similar, except the "great idea" was to run the bus'
engine until its gas tank - in the dangling end of
the bus — ran empty, making that side lighter so
the bus tips the other way.

You Know the Rest...

The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th

Dimension sees Team Banzai holding off an attack
on their headquarters by the Lectroids. As Sydney
and Reno sneak through one of the labs, they pass a
high-pressure vice with a watermelon in it. Sydney
asks "Why's that watermelon there?" Reno replies
"I'll tell you later." If he does tell him later, he does so
offscreen.
Most any story set in the near-future United States
will have an "Xth Amendment" gag, about some
vague but hilarious amendment to the U.S.
Constitution that passed between now and the
story's timeframe. Here's an example from the movie
Demolition Man:
Lenina Huxley: Yes. The Schwarzenegger Presidential
Library. Wasn't he an actor when you...?
John Spartan: Stop! He was President?
Lenina Huxley: Yes! Even though he was not born in this
country, his popularity at the time caused the 61st Amendment
which states...
John Spartan: I don't wanna know. President...

In DodgeBall: A True Underdog Story, Gary Cole's

ESPN announcer character says "a double-fault
final-play elimination hasn't occurred since the
Helsinki episode of 1919. And I think we all
remember how that turned out!"

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