Notice how many Hollywood movies are OK until the ending? They are really struggling with tying things up in a satisfactory way. Isn't that the hard part of storytelling? And isn't this the hard part about life? The foolish man lives as if there is no end to his life (in both senses of the word). And the foolish movie is one where the "ending" seems like an afterthought, merely a concession to the fact that people can't sit and watch the damn thing forever.
Aristotle and Aquinas (from Aristotle) spoke of four causes: material, efficient, formal and final --final in the sense of "end" or purpose. I would hardly be the first person to note that the age of "science," in the name of objectivity, has forbidden us to consider formal and final causes. You're allowed to ask material questions: what and by what mechanism. You're not allowed to think about the nature and purpose of things. There's no End in sight --which, as my friend notes, pretty much kills the story, since the end defines the beginning and the middle.
