What Does the ‘Disclaimer’ Ending Say About Us? Alfonso Cuarón Explains His Intention

[This story contains major spoilers from the Disclaimer season finale.]

By the end of Disclaimer, viewers realize they were wrong.

The Apple TV+ series starring Cate Blanchett and from writer-director Alfonso Cuarón in the filmmaker’s first foray into television has been telling a multi-narrative story. There are four sets of storytellers in the seven-part series. There’s Kevin Kline’s first-person narrator, Blanchett’s second-person narrator, there are the people around Blanchett’s character (played by Sacha Baron Cohen and Kodi Smit-McPhee), and then there’s the contents of the book in the series, The Perfect Stranger. Not until the finale do viewers realize that they have been listening to everyone’s point of view except for Blanchett’s, and have created an unreliable narrative.

After six episodes of acclaimed journalist Catherine Ravenscroft (Blanchett) being painted as a terrible mother and wife, whose self-absorbed affair with 19-year-old stranger Jonathan (Louis Partridge) while on vacation in Italy led to his death and the near-death of her own 4-year-old son, Cuarón’s finale in his adaption of Renée Knight’s 2015 novel reveals that, in fact, that teenager whom a younger Catherine (played by Leila George) was supposedly having a holiday affair with was actually her rapist.

The story that had been fed to Catherine’s husband Robert (Cohen), her son Nicholas (Smit-McPhee), her coworkers and to viewers by Perfect Stranger author Nancy (Lesley Manville), the deceased mother of Jonathan and husband to Stephen (Kline), turned out to be a piece of total fiction of how Nancy perceived her son’s final days. In reality, Catherine — when she finally speaks in her own voice, after being silenced and vilified — opens up to Stephen (Kline) in a harrowing monologue from Blanchett about the horrific night before his son’s death where he brutally raped her for three-plus hours; an encounter that preceded her later finding out she was pregnant and terminating the possible baby with her rapist.

So the following day in Italy, when Jonathan seemingly became a hero and ran out into the ocean to save a young Nicholas from drowning and Jonathan ended up drowning in the rough seas instead, Catherine didn’t shout out to help her rapist. She explains to Stephen, and to viewers, that his death meant she never had to speak about that night, so she let fate take its course. She’d never had to relive her trauma out loud, until now, when she is forced to share because of Stephen’s relentless and misguided pursuit of vengeance.

“Almost everyone has created a judgment of Catherine that is completely different from the ending that we reveal,” Cuarón tells The Hollywood Reporter of the finale’s flip on the story. “It was a way for audiences to confront their own judgments.”

Below, Cuarón explains his intention behind the gut-punch finale reveal, talks about the danger of unchecked narratives and the one thing that Blanchett, also an executive producer on the series, was most adamant about. He also encourages viewers to watch the limited series again: “You see the show of a woman who is trying to speak and nobody lets her. Everybody is creating judgments about her but not letting her talk.”

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Why did Disclaimer work better as a series than a film?

Because the film in my head required longer development of story. I first tried to visit the possibility of it, but it didn’t make any sense. So years later, I approached it as a series.

When did you first try to approach it?

I read the book before it was published; the writer sent it to me. And then I tried to put it together in my head and I realized that I didn’t know how to do it in a conventional film length form. But then it was later on when there was this opportunity to turn it into a series. I first read it before Roma. And then the opportunity to do it as a series was after Roma.

The series explores multiple narratives and who gets to control the narrative. You did warn us right from the start that there may not be reliable narrators here. Why did you use Catherine’s point-of-view as a second-person voiceover narrator?

So, there are three different voices in terms of narrators. There’s a first person-narrator that is Stephen [Kevin Kline]; a second-person narrator that is for Catherine [who is not voiced by Blanchett] and a third person that is the world around Catherine: her office, her family, her son, her husband. What I was intrigued about with the second-person voice is that it’s not used very often in film, books or novels, and that’s because it is an accusative tense [as it’s called] in French and Spanish, meaning that you are referring to “you,” but it’s almost in in the same [tone] you use when you accuse someone. And I wanted to see how the combination of those voices would affect the judgment of the [viewers]. Because inevitably, you are going to trust the one that is the “me,” and question the “you.”

I read that you shot this almost as one long film. How challenging was it to find the cinematic language that you used for each perspective?

That was a discussion we had from the get-go. I had that conversation first with Chivo [Emmanuel Lubezki, cinematographer] about incorporating a second cinematographer [Bruno Delbonnel] to have a greater contrast between the narratives, because each one has its unique cinematic language. And then everything else happened very organically. The ones that were clearer were the first person and second person, with Stephen and the Catherine. And then the question was how to capture the third person. The third person happens only when neither Catherine nor Steven are around those characters. And that came after.

But then there’s a fourth narrative that displays [what’s] in the book, and that has a completely different cinematic language and is a narrative that is obviously romanticized, from the visuals and the color but also the performances and music. The music is very, very romanticized, as opposed to the rest of the score in the show that is way more restrained.

Are you anticipating that any viewers will suspect the finale plot twist?

So far, our experience showing the series in different festivals and different screenings has proven that, I have to say, almost everyone has created a judgment of Catherine that is completely different from the ending that we reveal. I guess that we’re so conditioned to respond to certain judgments, particularly when it refers to women, but also to mothers.

How did you decide when to reveal it: Why does it pack the biggest punch in this way?

It was so important. So, we talked about the four narrations — the first, the second, the third, the writer [Nancy] and the book. But there’s another narration that is even more important: the narrative that the audience is making as they watch the show. And the most important thing was the confrontation of those narratives; the audience is creating that narrative through their judgment. So it was important to bring all of those narratives and confront those narratives with the reality that we’re presenting at the end. It was a way for audiences to confront their own judgments.

What was your vision for the contrast between the two Jonathans (played by Louis Partridge) that we see?

They are completely different versions. One is the version that springs out of the fantasy of Nancy, the mother, trying to romanticize her son as this young, very, very naïve man. More like a late teenager, very naïve and generous. While the reality confronts us with a very angry and disturbed young man. It’s pretty much two different characters and that’s something that Louis Partridge played beautifully, because he’s playing two completely different characters. Not unlike Leila George playing two different Catherines. One is the Catherine of the book who is this woman who is very secure and who is going to seduce this kid; she’s uncompromising about getting what she wants. And then we present the reality, which is a woman who feels feels insecure as a mother staying alone with her child on vacation, and it’s two completely different women.

We don’t see much of the backstory about the real Jonathan. Louis Partridge in an interview with THR said he landed on a borderline personality disorder/narcissism that he believes he inherited from his mother Nancy (Lesley Manville), who he called the real monster in the story.

What was interesting, and something that Cate Blanchett was very adamant, is that audiences should be able to watch the whole show a second time and they will see a completely different show. Because now the audiences, without the veil of their own judgment, would be able to see the real dynamics that are happening. If you see the dynamic in Stephen’s family, it’s Nancy who is a very manipulative woman who is always undermining Stephen, always protecting the son. And what we understand also is that the son always undermines the father. So we could say there is a kind of pathological relationship between Nancy and her son.

How do you anticipate viewers will feel about the choice Catherine (played by Leila George in flashback) makes during Jonathan’s (Partridge) drowning once we find out the real story?

I think that Catherine makes it very clear as she confronts Stephen. She’s coming out of the night before where that man who is drowning had just brutalized her. It’s unimaginable what is going on in her mind. Definitely, the first thought that will come to her mind would not be, “I want to save him.” And actually, when this person dies, she says, “I was glad.” Suddenly, that perpetrator of all that pain she endured was gone. Nevertheless, the actions he committed didn’t die and kept living inside her, affecting her, affecting her relationship with her own son. And the only thing that she had was to create this mask of this very successful woman.

Did you film chronologically?

As much as we could, that is correct. We were jumping sometimes. We would shoot Catherine up to a certain point. Then we’d shoot with Stephen up to a certain point, and then go back to Catherine and then back to Stephen.

So when it came to filming the rape scene, the characters had already filmed the romantic/erotic version by that time?

Yes. We had already shot Italy. We shot the seduction scenes, and that informed a lot. And then we shot the bedroom scenes with a separation of maybe a week between one and the other, shooting first the romantic scene. They knew each other and had become very good friends [by then].

Louis also in our interview spoke about how he physically ramped up before filming to get into an animalistic mindset. How long did it take you to film those scenes and what support was there for the actors?

Those scenes took a while to shoot. Maybe a week each. Of course, there was an intimacy coordinator present all the time. She was fantastic because she allowed the creative art and the directors, the actors and cinematographer to explore what we needed to explore, but she was always present for any, any, any concern, I think everybody felt very good and very protected; she was involved in the process in a very close way and I’m very grateful about that. And I also was advised and had the consultancy of Lydia Cacho, who is a journalist and a writer who has specialized in trauma in documented cases not very dissimilar to the ones that we were portraying. She could bring not only the truthfulness about what we were doing, but also try to figure out how to do it in a responsible way. Because there was always the concern of not crossing the line and to not make it exploitative, yet also truthful in terms of the specific details that are more telling and that come together with the act of violence.

The series leaves you thinking about many things, particularly about how people can believe something without asking questions or knowing facts. Sacha Baron Cohen’s character, Robert, realizes this in the end, when Stephen (Kline) asks him why he never questioned his own judgment about his wife. Why was it important that we don’t really hear Catherine talk until the end?

Because this is something that very likely would happen. Very often when people experience a trauma as such, they have kept it hidden. When they try to articulate, it’s very difficult for them to articulate that trauma. And it’s very difficult to articulate if they are forced to speak. And here, clearly, Stephen is forcing her to talk and to try to articulate. If you see the show for a second time, you see a completely different show. You see the show of a woman who is trying to speak and nobody lets her speak. Everybody is creating judgments about her but not letting her talk.

Catherine makes a decisive decision to leave Robert (Cohen) in the end, accusing him of being relieved that she was raped, rather than that she cheated. What does that drive home?

Pretty much that conversation between Catherine and Robert is what Cate and I were gearing for. It was something fundamental. It was pretty much the thesis of it all, because otherwise it would seem almost as if you’re punishing Catherine, that you only accept Catherine because she was raped and you would not accept her if she had a night of pleasure. Because very well it could have happened that all she had was a night of pleasure and now everybody is judging her.

This finale comes after the U.S. election. Do you anticipate a bigger reaction from an audience who is now digesting those results?

I believe the reason of the results is nothing but a manipulation of narratives. And the danger that we’re living in this world that is overpopulated by narratives. We’re invaded by narratives and we have become addicted to narratives. And now, narratives are becoming just a tidbit of information, rather than a whole analysis and contemplation. In this world that we’re addicted to, it’s very confusing, because we’re invaded by these conflicting narratives all the time. One that hits emotional cords is going to hit the strongest. And particularly if it confirms — as [journalist] Christiane Amanpour says at the beginning of Disclaimer — your most deeply held beliefs. All these narratives, it’s not that they’re creating those behaviors. They are awaking dormant behaviors that are already there.

Do you anticipate any viewers will question Catherine’s version of events in the end?

Well, I’m sure that will happen. There will be people like such. And that would be a very sad state of affairs!

I know you wrote this part for Cate Blanchett and that, also as an executive producer, you worked closely with her on this. What were some of her most impactful contributions?

Her most impactful contribution is called Disclaimer. This is kind of like a two-hander. We did it together from the beginning and to the very, very end she was involved in every single… From the moment she read the script, she was so involved in the rewrites that we did later on, and then she was involved in every single casting decision we made. And, of course, she was very respectful with the other actors; we worked so closely in each one of the scenes involving Catherine, and then with the ending as well.

Where do you envision Catherine when you imagine her future, do you see her and Nicky (Smit-McPhee) continuing to repair their relationship?

In the core of everything, this in many was is also about families. Because if you see the whole thing again, you realize it is about two mirrored families. In one hand is Catherine and her family, and in the other is Stephen and his family. One has this very manipulative relationship through Nancy, and the other one is emotionally repressed. And at the end, after being inundated in this torrent of narrative and judgments — and this is what I believe, in this world we are in made up of contradictory narratives — the only antidote to that is love. And that’s what Catherine found again. And the same for Nicholas. They found love again. And with that arises a new possibility. What is going to happen? I don’t know. I don’t believe in happy ever after because that doesn’t exist. But I believe in the possibilities in the future, and surely Catherine and Nicholas both have new possibilities for the future.

Is this the end of Disclaimer?

I think we closed the chapter of Disclaimer. There would not be a point of continuing the story further. I think that’s it, for good or for evil, that’s it. That’s what Disclaimer is.

Do you want to do more television?

I would love to do television, but not in the near future. It was a very long process, I think I need to cleanse my palate doing a film that will take a bit less time to shoot, edit and complete. But, who knows? You never know. You know… life. We never dictate what is going to happen. But in principle, I don’t want to engage in another project as long as that because it took a long, long time to shoot.

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Disclaimer is now streaming on Apple TV+. Read THR‘s post-finale interview with Louis Partridge.