Cocoon Ending Explained: Good Things Can't Last Forever

One thing Douglas Adams taught us in "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" is this: Dolphins usually know what's up when it comes to visitors from outer space. They're ahead of the curve at the beginning of "Cocoon," too, which opens with the friendly marine mammals frolicking in a sunken city before witnessing strange lights beaming through the clouds.

Ron Howard's fourth feature shares similarities with "Close Encounters of the Third Kind," although the beats are different. Its focus is on a group of seniors hitching a ride with friendly aliens to avoid illness and mortality, rather than a guy who is quite happy leaving his kids behind for a fantastic UFO journey. It's one of that '80s micro-genre of sci-fi movies centering around elderly actors, which Steven Spielberg had a big hand in. "Kick the Can," his segment in "Twilight Zone: The Movie," followed a group of old folks who are transformed into younger versions of themselves by a magical childhood game; he later produced "Batteries Not Included," which re-teamed Jessica Tandy and Hume Cronyn from "Cocoon" and its less successful sequel.

"Cocoon" proved that actors in their advancing years could be a viable box office draw, pulling down a healthy return of $85 million from its $17.5 million budget. I always enjoyed it when I was a kid, but it is a film that grows more poignant the older you get when grandparents pass away and you start getting a few wrinkles of your own. It treats its elderly characters with respect and feels timeless, despite the presence of Steve Guttenberg. With themes of aging, mortality, and allusions to mythology, it's a story that is relevant in any decade. Let's take a look at how those themes play out in the touching finale.

After the mysterious opening scene, "Cocoon" takes us to St. Petersburg, Florida, where we meet the residents of the Sunny Shores retirement community. Chief among them is dapper Arthur (Don Ameche); gruff Ben (Wilford Brimley), who dotes on his grandson David (Barrett Oliver); and married couple Joe and Alma (Hume Cronyn and Jessica Tandy). They're a spirited bunch and their digs are pretty comfortable, but mortality is closing in on them. Joe is diagnosed with cancer and one of their neighbors passes away in his room.

The three guys regularly trespass into a nearby empty mansion to use the pool. Unknown to them, the house has been rented by a group of aliens from the planet Antarea, led by Walter (Brian Dennehy). Disguised as humans, they're here on Earth to pick up their friends who were left behind when Atlantis sank 10,000 years ago. To recover the protective cocoons, Walter and his team hire down-on-his-luck boat captain Jack (Steve Guttenberg) to take them to the site.

Arthur, Ben, and Joe find that the pool has rejuvenating qualities. They soon have an extra spring in their step, recover their libido, and gad about town like young men again. More importantly, the water's healing power sends Joe's cancer into remission. Meanwhile, Jack spies on Kitty (Tahnee Welch), an attractive young member of Walter's team, and gets a shock when she removes her skin, revealing her true form. He freaks out at first but agrees to help the aliens find the remaining cocoons, which are stored in the pool.

The Antareans catch the guys bathing and kick them out. Deprived of the water's curative properties, Joe's cancer comes back. Ben successfully persuades Walter to let them keep using the pool, but it's only a matter of time before they let the secret slip.

Walter's proviso for letting the three friends use the pool is that they don't tell anyone else and avoid messing with the cocoons, which increase in number as they are salvaged from the sea floor. Things go wrong because mankind, even represented by three nice old guys like Arthur, Ben, and Joe, can't receive a wondrous gift without abusing or exploiting it.

Feeling virile again, Joe can't resist flirting with another woman, causing a rift in his marriage to Alma. Giddy with youthfulness, they also draw suspicion from their friends in the retirement community, who figure out that the source of their sudden joie de vivre is the pool. The other seniors greedily mob the pool house and unwittingly drain it of its life-restoring powers. Even worse, they senselessly crack one of the cocoons, causing the death of the alien hibernating inside.

Walter is angry and disappointed with the guys for betraying his trust, feeling the pain of grief for the first time as his friend dies. Depleted, the pool is unable to regenerate the slumbering Antareans, and Walter fears they won't survive the interstellar trip home in their current state. He has no choice but to put them back in the sea and return for them at a later date. Trying to make amends, the Sunny Shores residents help them secrete the cocoons back among the sunken ruins of Atlantis.

Luckily for the old folk, and probably mankind at large, the Antareans are a very forgiving bunch. Walter offers to take the seniors with them on their spaceship, where they will essentially live forever. This means a tough choice: The price for immortality is leaving behind their family, friends, and home planet for good.

"Cocoon" is very thoughtful about how it portrays the senior characters and the challenges they face. The residents of Sunny Shores have a pleasant enough life, but they can't escape the fact that they are gradually fading away as their friends and loved ones die around them. They are diminished by old age, robbing them of their vitality and leaving them with a dwindling quality of life. There is also the issue of self-esteem as they can't function how they used to, and the orderlies in the retirement community treat them with disrespect simply because they are old. Recovering their youth is played for gentle comedy, especially in the scene when Arthur tears up the dance floor at the local disco. Overall, it is treated as a miracle that gives them back their dignity.

Not all the residents are it. Bernie (Jack Gilford) views using the pool as going against nature and refuses to let his wife Rose (Herta Ware) take the waters. This leads to a heartbreaking scene when she passes away and Bernie takes her to the pool in a desperate attempt to revive her, but it's too late because the other residents have already drained the rejuvenating powers.

With the prospect of escaping death on the table, "Cocoon" asks: Would you leave everything behind if it meant you could live forever? The friends respond to this dilemma in thought-provoking ways. Joe tells Alma that he will only go along if she goes with him, as he'd rather only have six months by her side than spend eternity without her. Ben and his wife Mary (Maureen Stapleton) are prepared to make the sacrifice, leaving their beloved grandson behind. Bernie, even though he has nothing to stay for after Rose dies, decides to stay because Earth is his home.

Walter explains to Ben that he chose Atlantis over the North Pole as an Antarean base on Earth. "Every 10 or 11,000 years I make a horrible mistake," he admits; 20 of his friends were stranded beneath the water in their cocoons when the island sank. But is Florida's Gulf Coast a viable location for the legendary lost city, and how does that timeline fit in with the myth?

The story of a fabulous sunken civilization has caught people's imagination since the time of Plato. He described Atlantis as a powerful island state that succumbed to hubris and angered the Gods, who destroyed it with fire and earthquakes. Writing around the year 360 B.C., the philosopher said the events occurred 9000 years before his time, which fits in with Walter's estimation of how long ago the disaster occurred. 

Many scholars and historians believe that Atlantis never existed, but that hasn't stopped others from seeking the sunken paradise. Given its association with Plato and ancient Greece, the majority of possible sites are dotted in and around the Mediterranean Sea. A popular location is around the mid-Atlantic as Plato described Atlantis as lying beyond the Pillars of Hercules, better known nowadays as the Strait of Gibraltar. Farther flung suggestions include Antarctica, South America, the North Pole, and the Indian Ocean. More recently, attention has turned to the Atlantic Coast of Spain, where some researchers believe they have discovered evidence of the lost city.

One place that doesn't seem to come up is the Gulf of Mexico, the location of Atlantis in "Cocoon." However, Atlantis really was discovered in the Gulf in 1998: The Atlantis Oil Field off the coast of Louisiana.

Apart from its eternal themes of aging and mortality, "Cocoon" feels like a timeless story because it makes many allusions to ancient myths. Atlantis is one, and the life-restoring pool is clearly meant to represent the fabled Fountain of Youth. Stories of hidden springs with miraculous qualities go back as far as Herodotus, and people have sought these legendary sources of healing water for centuries. Inspired by the Greek historian's writings, Alexander the Great was said to have searched for it in the 4th Century B.C.

One of the most famous tales relates to the Spanish explorer Ponce de León, who was rumored to be seeking the Fountain of Youth on his travels in the 16th century. While the adventurer and conquistador never wrote about it himself, the legend persisted and sources variously placed the location around the Caribbean or modern-day Florida. To this day, you can still sample the waters at the Fountain of Youth Archaeological Park in St. Augustine, FL, reputed as the spot where de León landed on his quest.

Although not directly analogous, aspects of "Cocoon" also call to mind other myths such as Prometheus, the Holy Grail, and the tale of Icarus. Walter can be seen as a Promethean figure; like the Titans, he is essentially immortal, but he is punished for his giving a wondrous gift to mankind by seeing his friend die and having to abort his mission. Much like the Fountain of Youth, treasure hunters have sought the Holy Grail for centuries, and its supposed healing qualities provided the MacGuffin for "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade." Lastly, like Icarus, the seniors defy nature's order but fly too high, resulting in a metaphorical fall when their friends destroy the pool's powers.

Appropriately for the age range of its main characters, "Cocoon" proceeds at a gentle pace before kicking into higher gear for the finale. With all the prospective space farers on his boat, Jack tries to evade the coast guards and reach the rendezvous with the Antarean flying saucer. David, who has jumped aboard to be with his grandparents, buys them a little time by diving into the ocean. The incoming spacecraft generates a thick fog bank, providing cover for a successful pickup, drawing the boat into its interior and soaring into space.

With the group of seniors presumed lost at sea, the film ends with a service on the beach. The pastor goes through the usual platitudes, reassuring the weeping congregation that their loved ones are now in safe hands and will live for eternity in a better place. This is where the film draws parallels with the Christian imagery. We already know that the Antareans, in their natural form, resemble glowing angels, and the image of the boat rising up into the mother ship nods to the ascension of Jesus. The last shot shows the UFO disappearing into the welcoming light of another star system, making another comparison with Heaven. The elderly people on the boat have gone to live forever in a better place, just like the pastor says, but not quite in the way he imagines.

At the service, David sits gazing sadly at the sun beaming through the clouds, another classic piece of heavenly imagery. He'll miss his nan and granddad, but he is at least comforted by the knowledge that they have really become immortal and will live on among the stars.