Curious to know how An Inspector Calls ends? Then you have come to the right place! The British film An Inspector Calls, which was released in the year 2015, is a crime drama film that received so much success back then.
With an amazing plot and an outstanding cast, what fans loved the most about An Inspector Calls was the ending of it because, even though the suspense is unraveled in the end, it left fans with many questions. So, how do “An Inspector Calls” end? Let us find out. But before we begin, here’s a bit about what An Inspector Calls is all about.
Inspired by the 1945 play written by J.B. Priestley, An Inspector Calls takes you to the life of a Birling family, which is wealthy and has a strong influence on powerful authorities. Even though this family looks like an ideal family, there are secrets hidden behind everyone’s lives. When a Police Inspector who wants to investigate the suicide of a girl reaches the Birling house, shocking secrets come out, which devastates all the family members.
An Inspector Calls is filled with mysteries, but everything is uncovered gradually, which lets the viewers conclude. So, what plot twists are there in An Inspector Calls, and what happens in the end? What kind of answers is the inspector looking for, and is there anyone in the Birling family who killed the girl? Well, if you have many such questions, then read this post till the end.
An Inspector Calls: Plot Summary
An Inspector Calls opens up with a girl in a room and a man asking her if she trusts god. She says yes because she has faced many things in her life, and the only one that she can trust now is god. After that, the scene changes, and we see the Birling family preparing for a joyful event. Sheila Birling is happily wearing a beautiful dress, and all the family members are waiting for her at a dining table.
Gerald Croft, the son of a wealthy businessman, arrives in the house, and this is when we learn that the Birling family arranges a dinner to plan the wedding of Sheila and Gerald. While having dinner, Arthur Birling, a garment factory owner, feels ecstatic that his daughter is marrying Gerald, thinking he can now work collaboratively with his father’s business to earn a huge profit. In the middle of the discussion, out of nowhere, an inspector arrives at the Birling mansion.
Interrupting the dinner, Inspector Goole lets the family know that he wants to investigate the suicide of a girl named Eva Smith. He shows her picture to Arthur, and in seconds he remembers who she is. When other family members ask the inspector to show her picture, he denies it. Arthur, then tells the inspector how he knows Eva Smith. Arthur says that she was working in his factory a long time back, and she wanted her and her colleagues’ salaries to increase.
In the flashback scene, we see Arthur staring at Eva because he likes her for her beauty. She started protesting for a salary increase and asked her colleagues not to join the factory until Arthur increased the salary. Artur offers Eva that he will increase her salary by giving her a senior position, but he would not increase the salary for other girls. Eve denies it, and after some days, all girls join the work for the same salary because of the lack of money. When even Eva wants to rejoin the work, Arthur terminates Eva from her job.
Gerald then starts investigating Sheila by showing her the picture of Eva Smith. Like her father, even Sheila knows she has done something horrible to Eva. She then tells Inspector Goole how she knows her. Sheila once visited a store where she wanted to buy some clothes.
After leaving her job, Eva started working in that particular store where Sheila had arrived. While looking into a mirror, trying on new clothes, Eva smirks, and Sheila though that she is laughing at her. Out of anger, Sheila warned the shop owner to terminate Eva from her job. After telling the whole story, Sheila bursts into tears feeling that Eva committed suicide because of her.
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Sheila asks Inspector Goole if she dies because of her and her father or not. Inspector Goole says that Eva changed her name after the incident and started working in a bar as Daisy Renton. When Gerald hears the name, Daisy Renton, he gets shocked, and after seeing the same picture of Eva Smith, he narrates the story of him and Daisy. When he met her at the bar, she was getting sexually harassed by a customer in a bar, and Gerald saved Daisy from him.
Gerald, when he had a conversation with Daisy, got to know that she did not eat anything for so many days, and that is why he offered her food and shelter for her. After getting sexually connected with her, Gerald left Daisy alone by handing her some money. Hearing this, Sheila gets shocked and breaks her engagement with Gerald. Even Gerald feels guilty, thinking he is one of the reasons why Daisy committed suicide.
Why Did Eva Smith Commit Suicide?
Inspector Goole, who wants to investigate the suicide of Eva Smith, already knows everything about her life through the diary in which Eva wrote about how all of the members of the Birling family abused her and led her towards the decision to commit suicide. Sheila’s mother, Sybil, who runs a charity organization, gets approached by Inspector Goole. Inspector Google makes Sybil remember a young girl who asked for monetary help from Sybil because she was pregnant. She reached out to Sybil as Mrs. Birling, but Sybil never trusted her.
Sybil thought that Mrs. Birling wanted money for undue means. Sybil asked Mrs. Birling to leave, telling her that she could not help her by any means. Mrs. Birling was none other than Eva Smith, who believed the in the good deeds of Sybil, but even Sybil could not understand her situation.
Inspector Goole lets the Birling family know that after this incident, Eva Smith decided to end her life because everyone that she trusted broke her into pieces, and she was left with nothing. But whose child Eva was carrying? At first, everyone thinks that it was Gerald’s, but they ultimately get to know that there was someone else behind all of this who left her alone with the child.
The one who made Eva pregnant was Eric Birling, brother of Sheila Birling and daughter of Arthur and Sybil Birling, who raped Eva Smith in a drunken condition. When he got sober, he felt guilty about raping Eva and asked her to marry him. However, Eva did not agree, telling him that she would not fit into his class because she was not as wealthy as him. Eric guiltily gave some money to Eva and left her alone. Soon, Eva got pregnant with his child and asked Sybil for help.
An Inspector Calls: Ending Explained
After hearing all of the confessions, Inspector Goole makes everyone realize how their actions took Eva’s life and leaves the Berling mansion. Soon, Arthur gets to know that he did not record any of the confessions, and that is why he calls the police authorities to ask them if anyone named Mr. Goole has taken a transfer. The authorities let Arthur know that there is no inspector named Inspector Goole has joined the police department.
Arthur also asks if anyone named Eva Smith committed suicide, and he gets the news that the police department has not received any such case of suicide. Arthur feels ecstatic that Eva has not committed suicide and that no one in his family will get into jail. However, Eric and Sheila burst out in tears of guilt and trauma for destroying the life of someone innocent who deserved a better life.
In the other scene, we see Inspector Goole at Eva’s house with her diary in his hands. Eva does not know who he is, and when she is alone, she consumes poison. Inspector Goole immediately takes her to the hospital, but she soon counts her last breaths. In the final scene, we see Inspector Goole holding Eva’s hand. The scene cuts, and he disappears from the hospital.
Soon, Arthur gets the news that Eva committed suicide, and Arthur and his whole family gets shocked. The final scene takes us to the first scene in the movie, where a man asks Eva if she trusts god, and she says yes. The scene suggests that Inspector Goole is, in fact, a god who visited Arthur’s family to make them realize their mistakes. Because their small mistakes and guilts make a huge impact on the lives of Eva. In the end, when Inspector Goole (God) disappears, it is suggested that he takes her with him on the journey to her afterlife.
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