All of Us Strangers ending explained

If your heart didn’t break this year, it’s about to – here’s Andrew Haigh’s All of Us Strangers ending explained in full.

Starring Andrew Scott and Paul Mescal, early reviews of All of Us Strangers have been overwhelmingly positive, with fans hyped for its release.

In our five-star review, we described the movie as “There’s no shying away from it – All of Us Strangers is one of the crowning triumphs of the year. To engage with it is to commit yourself to having changed on the other side, confronting demons you’d long forgotten that you’ve harbored away. Andrew Scott is essentially spearheading an emotional cinematic revolution – and it’s not to be missed.”

With the movie now in theaters across the US, here’s the ending of All of Us Strangers explained. Warning – spoilers ahead!

All of Us Strangers ending explained: Adam relives his past

Adam (Andrew Scott) is a screenwriter and lives alone in a fairly derelict block of flats in London. He spends most of his days by himself while working on a screenplay about his childhood. One day, Harry (Paul Mescal) knocks on his door, claiming to have seen him around the building. Harry asks if he can come in for a drink, but Adam refuses, closing the door on him. Trying to find inspiration for his work, Adam takes a trip back to his childhood home – somewhere he hasn’t been in about 30 years.

Exploring the local area, a man finds Adam wandering a field, beckoning him to come to the local newsagents. The man takes Adam home with him, where we find that said stranger is actually Adam’s Dad (Jamie Bell). His Mum (Claire Foy) opens the door of his childhood house, welcoming him in as if no time has passed at all. The trio has dinner together, with Mum and Dad asking questions about Adam’s life. He leaves, with Mum asking him to visit again.

A little while later, Adam sees Harry in the building and apologizes for not inviting him in before. Harry goes back to Adam’s where the pair start an intimate relationship. Adam tells Harry about his script and reveals that his parents died when he was a child. He then goes back to his childhood house, where only Mum is in. Adam comes out to her, with the pair having an awkward conversation about how the world has changed.

Relationships get complicated

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Adam and Harry continue to grow closer, spending a lot of time at Adam’s flat. He also returns to visit Dad, talking through Adam’s conversation with Mum. Adam also reveals the extent of bullying in his childhood years, leading Dad to apologize for not doing more to be there for him. Time and space begin to feel as though they stand still, with Adam slowly revealing more details about his past. He tells Harry that Mum and Dad died in a car accident, living with the regret that he never got to make his peace or spend more time with them.

One night, Harry and Adam go out to a club, with Adam becoming disorientated as he continues to drink. Losing sight of Harry, Adam blacks out, waking up to Christmas with his Mum and Dad. Together, the three put ornaments on the tree while singing Always On My Mind by the Pet Shop Boys. The family takes a photo together, with Adam reverting back to his childhood state in the picture. He makes his parents promise not to go out, remembering that this is the night of their car crash.

Waking with a start, Harry explains that he took Adam home after he was distressed and calling out for his parents. Adam later tries to take Harry to meet them at his childhood home, with no one answering the door. Though Adam can see his parents’ reflections in the window, Harry is freaked out and leaves. Waking up in his childhood house, Mum and Dad tell Adam that the visits will soon stop as they believe they are negatively impacting Adam’s life.

One final twist awaits

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Unable to cope with having to part from them again, the All of Us Strangers ending shows Adam begging for one last day out with his parents, with the trio heading to a shopping center that Adam loved as a kid. Sitting down at a diner, Adam orders food for the three before pleading with his parents not to leave him again. They both state that the visits were never going to last forever and say how proud they are of the man that Adam has become. Mum and Dad both slowly vanish, in the order – and with the afflictions – that the pair had suffered in the car crash.

Back at the block of flats, Adam tries to find Harry, entering his apartment for the first time. Adam is met with Harry’s decomposing body in the bedroom, seemingly having died the night that he knocked on Adam’s door. Harry then appears behind Adam, asking if he is in the bedroom. He tells Adam that he never wanted him to see Harry like that, with Adam taking Harry back to the safety of his own apartment. Adam lies next to Harry’s ghost, promising to protect him from the world outside. Frankie Goes To Hollywood’s The Power of Love plays them out, zooming out to reveal the pair as one star in a never-ending galaxy.

All of Us Strangers is in cinemas now. You can read our review here, and more of the latest TV & Movies news here.