we're not kids anymore.
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Kiana Khansmith
#extradirty
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Andulka
Mike Driver
roma★
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taylor price
Show & Tell
shark vs the universe
Monterey Bay Aquarium
PR's Tumblrdome
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Origami Around
sheepfilms
Misplaced Lens Cap
Product Placement
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@400days
An elaborate ruse with a deeper, hidden objective.
ScreenRant.com just posted a very smart article about the meaning and ending of the film:
“Despite the fact that the ending isn't made concise or clear as far as exactly what happened in 400 Days, it's possible to find solace in the fact that speculating is just as entertaining as knowing the truth.”
Read the full article here.
Through the Looking Glass
Via Mike Lenz
I've read damn near most of these comments now. Just watched 400 days on Netflix (finally got around to it) and was going over the filming my mind as it played on, jumping back and forth between whether it was real or not. I noticed that the memory game served as a nice part of the test seeing as Dvorak noticed the duplicates of the townspeople. The movie has so many red herrings that the red herrings become anti-red herrings...
Which led me to think that what the movie truly is... is the experiment, it's a way to turn the mirror on yourself and critically think. A hard core optimist would view it all as a test (down to the murders being staged) and a total pessimist would say the experiment ended when the moon got destroyed and now people have gone cannibal. The movie is an experiment on us. It's to see which of us were attentive enough to notice the news reporters were the diner patrons. Allows us to identify with certain characters and either trust Emily really almost died, or side with Dvorak (as I did) and accuse her of lying. It makes you want to not identify with Dvorak because he can kill a mouse easily and so cognitively we disassociate ourselves with him, even though all the"evidence" in the movie points to him being right.
All in all, fantastic movie, I wouldn't change a thing about it, especially if it is meant to be an experiment on us, the viewers, because if you allow the story to be cast in stone as exactly one thing the subjectivity of the movie is lost and it becomes just another thriller, instead of a movie that includes you in the story as a narrator.
A Good One
via comment section:
I did the same thing - googled it after watching this film last night lol - I've read all of the comments (took ages) and there's a few observations I haven't seen mentioned here, but I might have missed them. Overall I believe that they never leave the capsule but have delusions - I also think that maybe the female character isn't there in the end, she has been killed by the "captain" and he's imagining her being there. OR - vice versa. I think all of the things that happen later on relate back to things seen throughout the film, like his delusion is pulling things that really happened and creating a hallucination around them - like all of the people in the town being the last people they saw, and/or from the magazines. 1) In the cell the guy he gives the cigarette to becomes the butcher later on - he is wearing a light blue t-shirt with a picture of a wolf howling at a full moon. The moon obviously is explained as the "catastrophe" - and supposedly people go a little bit crazy when there is a full moon - so the howling at the moon is indicating they have all gone a little bit crazy because of the oxygen deprivation, and it also gives him the fantasy about the moon causing an apocalypse. Also in his delusion the butcher (who look menacing and you imagine wants to ruthlessly butcher you) is actually the big guy astronaut - who ruthlessly "butchered" the mouse - remember all of the blood from the mouse, and then all of the blood in the butchers "shop". The banging he hears in the cell also forms his delusion of the banging on the hatch. 2) The origami on the table in the diner is actually made from one of the napkins that "Zel" gives them - but you never see her make the napkin into something, and is that really what you'd be doing in that situation? I think this his mind making things that are really there fit his delusion. 3) In the bar the big dude asks the tender "what's the drink" and the bartender says "the less you know the better" - this is a reflection of when he is drinking the water early in the film and Bug tells him it's recycled urine (so Bug becomes the bar tender guy in the fantasy). Similarly the soup in the earlier clips "tastes like sh1t" - and the soup in the diner reflects this too. 4) When they find the map - someone above pointed out the town they go to is tranquility, and tranquility bay is where the Eagle landed on the moon. Also on the map is Eagle pass (another reference) and at the top is "Skin Bloff". According to my daughter Skin Bloff is some character in Minecraft - which is a game where you create your own world and create your own reality - I think a big clue right there. Also in that house the clock read 10 to 2 - if you look in any catalogue or shop or on a website all clocks are displayed showing 10 to 2 - it looks like a smiling face, so it's like he's seeing a clock that he's remembering from seeing an image of a clock - maybe.
5) Interestingly when Bug goes missing in the diner - he walks through a door and there are more and more corridors and doors - like a maze - like the one he drew all over the walls of his room - there's even an "exit" sign above one of the doors - I think this reflects him being in his delusion especially since he sees his son again. Also when they are walking around outside when they first (think that they've) left the capsule they come across a swing and he hears laughing, which had been in his delusion earlier. 6) I think that Zel is the doctor (female) - at first I thought it was the captain when he says in the Diner "I'll just call my wife", the woman comes out and says "I'm not his wife" and he says "we just haven't found the time" - I thought that was a reflection of the captains situation with the female character. But later on Zel says "you're suffering from oxygen deprivation - that's what's wrong with you" - sounds more like something the doctor would say, so either a) it's the captain hallucinating that the woman is Zel, or b) it's the doctor hallucinating that the captain is Zel. I'm sure there'll be a clue there somewhere to work out which is which. My gut feeling is the captain is hallucinating that the female character is Zel. Other odd bits - when the oxygen first drops she says "we'll suffer from delusions, memory loss, hallucinations - we need to watch each other" - I think this is where the paranoia sets in and things go really wrong. I think you can see the captain is deluded when he tells them to "suit up" - the big guy says "you know these aren't real space suits don't you - they were never meant to be worn". Also the guy who "breaks in" is superhuman fast when the captain sees him, suggesting that is him hallucinating, and the guy who breaksi n is running around outside in his underpants - but it's so cold they need to put on more clothing. I guess in delusions things don't quite add up overall, just from delusion to delusion. They all at times have red eyes - oxygen deprivation? The name ZEL - googling it ZEL is an abbreviation related to rocket and jet launches (zero length launch), and is also a kind of sheep (wolf on the t-shirt, then a sheep - wolf in sheeps clothing / wolves eat sheep?)? Darla -Zel's "wife"? - Darla was a character in Buffy the Vampire slayer who was "in league with the master" - could this reference the female being in league with (was it) Walter? Making Zel the captain? Also Zel has "7" written on his hand - 4 lines scored through then another 2 lines - are any of the astronauts referenced by numbers at any point? The mouse - you get mice in laboratory experiments (e.g. they are "lab rats" or "lab mice") - and it gets squashed - killed - and then so do they? Don't get why the video clip at the end is a recording unless it's just to add to the mystique of the film, but since all of the lights go brighter and sunlight shines in when the hatch is opened - it suggests it's all been a hallucination - but why the people in control wouldn't stop it when it started to go wrong - doesn't make sense (and the cameras are moving like someone is watching) - and who is really left at the end is questionable. Haven't fathomed the relevance of the playing cards, although Zel does have 2 dice tatooed on his shoulder - maybe this is a reference that Zel is the captain? That's it - on reflection of reading that - I'm still no clearer, LoL.
Life Finds a Way...
Kepler Industries is probably a corporation and not a government program. That being said, this could very well be an inhumane experiment but maybe it's more than that. What if the diner owner's theory is correct, and Kepler Industries (presumably named after the 🔭 telescope) predicts the asteroids impact (a few months ahead of time) and the lunar fallout after the fact. If they don't predict the fallout, is just another lunar meteor impact and life goes on.
Fine Young Cannibals
Via Anonymous Submission:
I believe what the dinner owner said was true. The moon was destroyed and entered earth's atmosphere. Blocking the sun and killing anything organic. How the trees disappeared so quickly, I'm not sure but few peeps did survive. I got a feeling of cannibalism right from the first scene of the town. The ending was simply a automated message stating they made it through 400 days. What happen to them was real.
Red Origami
Via Anonymous submission:
Not sure if this is a theory, but an awesome detail I noticed: I once read that the Japanese Space Agency makes their astronauts fold a thousand paper cranes as a test for trainees. It helps them track their mental state throughout training (i.e. well made origami versus sloppily made origami).
That’s just one detail I noticed. Gah! There’s a TON more going on under the surface with this movie! Bravo to Syfy for making a movie that makes us think for once!
400 Days on Syfy Channel!
Matt here. Just a quick interruption to let everyone know that the 400 Days Syfy television premiere is happening on the evening of Saturday, Nov 5 at 9/8c!
Thank you to everyone posting and submitting your reactions/theories on this site and others around the web. I hoped people would find the “movie as a puzzle” concept interesting and you haven’t let me down!
Frankenstein’s Monster’s Monster?
Hmmm...
From Kev Man (in the comments):
what you all fail to realise is it was ended like this so we could all have our own opinion and make our own minds up....this was all a test for a mental state....and the creator has done his test and the test was on us! how we all think ect...there is no right or wrong answer to this question....and it opens up a possibility to a sequel it could be an experiment it could not be there isn't enough information to decifer that....but there is so much information that you all think in too much detail....some things lead to an experiment some things don't.....and that's how its supposed to be we may get the right answer if another film is made we may not but either way it would be interesting to see what ideas the creator has to continue this story on
Occam’s Razor?
Via Anonymous:
The movie is just that - a movie. The theory that it was an experiment the whole time does not "add up" because they walked for miles once leaving the ship and Theo actually was stabbed. You can't put miles in every direction under glass and you certainly would not stab a study participant. The only logical story line is the one whereby they are in a study at the beginning, drugs and tests were administered, a cataclysmic event unfolded while they were down, and the world turned to shit.
They Never Left...
Via PullinJohnson:
I would have say don't overthink this folks... Remember Walter said it was an experiment on the mind and the doctor chimed in Reality can become anything the mind thinks...or some words to that effect. Bottom line is They never left the ship...end of story.
Did you not understand they were reacting to being isolated in a bad bad way. Theo lost all his marbles and killed Bug and Dvork. As someone else commented...this movie was spin on Vanilla Sky. Did anyone notice Theo seeing Bugs lucky charm in the blood bath kitchen before he let the depraved man out of the cage..(symbolism of them all being locked up) And who noticed the oragami figure on diner table...do you really think the doctor fashioned it while sitting in an apocalyptic world..yeah she liked to make them..but seriously? It was an experiment that went very bad...4 went in and 2 survived. A good movie about the human mind and the effects of isolation and alternate reality. Cheers!
The Dreams of Mice and Men
Ha ha! Via Anonymous Submission:
The mouse dreamed the entire thing?
The Mouse’s Tale
Via 4 part submission from Anonymous on the Submit Your Own Theory link:
Damn, I’m really digging that there is so much happening underneath the surface of this movie, and the symbols that seem to follow and connect the characters, especially with Bug, in the first portion of the movie, consistently looks like he is trapped in an unseen cage; claustrophobic, confused, scared, etc. That is until he finds a mouse on board and, for a few moments, is relaxed.
This relaxed state Bug finds through his new rodent friend is swiftly uprooted by Dvorak, who stomps the rodent’s life away. Immediately after this, Dvorak experiences a bloody episode (dream/ hallucination), which would make sense; his selfish actions (literally lined in blood) mirror his psychoses.
Bug, too, experiences episodes that are completely aligned with his state of being: Bug has been obsessively drawing mazes (one that a mouse would presumably run through) on the walls of his room, and has been doing so with his ‘going away gift’ since before he found and then lost his mouse friend. When we see Bug having an episode, he almost looks like he’s an actual mouse, caught in tiny spaces, chasing after something he knows isn’t there.
Our discovery of his son’s death comes later, as he gets trapped Zel’s diner, trying to get back to his friends. His internal turmoil is mirrored by his appearance as someone who has been trapped in a maze for months. This maze symbol that has been following him the entire movie comes to a head as he disappears for good.
400 Days and Chill
I love this one. Via Eddie Adams here.
I must say thank you sir for getting a reaction out of me that is very rare, I began to scream, at the screen (actually at you I must admit) WHY WHY WHY DID YOU DO THIS TO ME WHY WHY WHY omg what a stupid, fucking, lame waste of my time this movie SUCKS I CANT BELIEVE I SPENT ALL TJIS TIME WATCHIMG THIS I DONT HABE TIME TO DISSECT IT!! I mean my man I am(was) more than pissed off but I must admit that being forced to go deep and think goes against my natural state of laziness and I'm actually being forced to figure this out and it makes me mad. So, contradictorily, I love it. Now I got something to ponder and freak out about. Thank you for mind fucking your viewers to the point of insanity, now I can just read their opinions as I research and pause and play and pause to read the next comment and fact check everything before I will eventually later on post my own (intelligent) theory. Fuck you Matt. I'm trying to relax here my dude.
Mission “Control”
Via submission form, cire0791 said:
I think the whole thing is what it purports to be, which is a psychological experiment to evaluate readiness for long term space travel. The woman is the control. The defense contractor conducting the experiment will always face a problem, which is that the participants will always know they are in an experiment. Therefore, they have to be convinced somehow that they are no longer in an experiment. This is accomplished through drugs and and other simulations. Only one candidate qualified.
This (and definitely no accident).
Via northwind twentyten on this excellent comment section:
this movie made me so mad, at first... part way through my girlfriend just gave up on it, turned over and went to sleep... i was in for the long haul and needed answers... after this movie was done i went straight to google to find out what the heck?!?!
i found it interesting that so many other people did the exact same thing, which brought me to the thought that "maybe this was done intentionally by the producer" and if so what a genius thing to do... if not, what an amazing accident to be thought out by anyone else interested in writing or story telling... its creative and original and takes you beyond just entertainment... i can totally envision a movie being made that leaves you wondering enough to research it afterwards to find answers and when googled, finding a trail of bread crumbs, so to speak, that lead you to a page stating "if youre reading this, than you have made it, and blah blah blah, having something inventive and totally original pertaining to psychological experimentation and your unknowing participation in this one... as if you and anyone else who watched this movie were actually being experimented on, for entertainment of course... as if only to make you feel that deception and shock of having been part of an experiment, really delivering to you a realistic cinematic experience... this is why i say that this movie made me mad, but only at first, because now after reading most of these comments and having these ideas i really feel that this movie was a bit more than your usual flick and love the fact that i didnt appreciate the film until it was over and i had to google it for answers...
as for the movie itself in the beginning they show clips of people being experimented on in what looks like invasive manners... this, after over looking it leads me to think that it actually was some messed up experiment, but heres the kicker, and someone commented about these previously and i just want to add to the thought, but they pointed out that if the experiment was for the psychological effects of long term space travel than why would she be feeding them hallucinogens? which was also a theory to the injections administered by the good doctor... but lets take a look at even just one example of psychological experiments done in the past in real life../ the milgrams obedience to authority experiment done in 1962 where he leads his subjects to believe that the experiment is based on a theory that people learn things correctly when they get punished... in fact he was having that subject believe he was hurting another person by shocking them slightly when they answered a question, of a list of questions, incorrectly but also that the voltage of the shock was increased with ever question answered incorrectly, and when asked to stop by the person they're inflicting this pain on, is told by the experimenter to ignore their pleas and continue with the questions even when the person becomes unresponsive... the point being he lied to his subjects to get an authentic observation... and i think the same in the case of this movie, perhaps they were told they were being experimented on for the long term psychological effects of space travel when really they were not... who knows though? i read a Q n A with matt osterman the writer and director of 400 days lol and he said he couldnt wait to see all the theories about the film and its ending and not really giving us an answer to wtf we just watched...
all in all, i like the fact that this made me sit here and really think and research some things and gave me some really neat ideas...
Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)
Via Supriyo here:
Firstly, I'm inclined to believe this whole movie, from the opening shot of Theo waking in his jail cell (imprisonment similar to the ship and being a prisoner of his own mind) was the beginning of a hallucination. I believe this whole movie occurred in Theo's head from an induced hallucination from maybe some new-age hallucinogen administered and monitored by Keplar to test the psyche of potential astronauts for future Mars missions. Emily even reminds us at the press conference "the human mind can be very powerful when left to its own devices". People died, Theo was even stabbed with little consequence, I could go on on how this couldn't have been a simulation even though Theo's mind wanted to believe so. It's true, the mind can do extraordinary things to cope or even deny the present. No coincidence it was very hazy and dreamlike from the opening shot and I don't think that was the result of a 4 day bender of drinking as our protagonist mentioned. Let's face it this whole movie was shot very dreamlike; with no sense of time, absence of rationale at times, to the zombie like people in the town (whom most were apart of the media or in the penthouse mag) not paying any attention to them until talked to and then not giving straight answers. Everything just felt very dreamy to me.
Let's dig deeper. Dvorak and Bug were just extensions of Theo's personality. Zell even reminded Theo it was only just the 2 of them(Emily and Theo), basically acting as polar opposites as if they were the good and bad side of Theo. Remember the temporal memory exam, Bug finishes first, Dvorak last.
Continue reading at Quora.
A Cruel World (possibly with Peep Holes)
Via James Lafayette here:
Another obvious clue not easily noticed... All of the cruel experiments shown in the clips during the entro of the movie... Watch them again, notice the distress and even pain some of them are enduring... That's clue #1, opening of the movie says "cruel experiment".
Forgot to mention, one of those clips seems to include some type of chemical being introduced via syringe... Others show men in control rooms or looking through peep holes and monitoring experiments... Some of the people in the experiments also appear to be experiencing mental issues...