Explaining the haunting ending of Presence, the new horror film shot from the ghost’s POV

Steven Soderbergh is allergic to annual leave. Bear in mind the man has retired from filmmaking already, he simply has not stopped. Despite the fact he’s got a Cate Blanchett starring action thriller called Black Bag looming in cinemas later this year, his first effort of 2025 – Presence – has just released. And the press has been crazy, with some (kind of over-zealously) declaring it one of the scariest films of the year – but mostly because of the fact Presence has a very intriguing and engaging premise. Presence is shot entirely from the perspective of the presence haunting the home, and this makes for fascinating viewing and turns the camera into a character of its own. A character with wordless motivation and likes and dislikes, and by the time you get to the ending everything clicks if you’ve been paying attention. Here’s a rundown of the ending of Presence, fully explained for those who might have been head scratching.

What is Presence about?

Steven Soderbergh’s Presence is a horror film with a gimmick, one that is, ahem – present – for the entirety of its lean one hour 25 runtime. Presence introduced us to the haunted house in which the action of the film never leaves, as we see a family purchase it from none other than Julia Fox. Lucy Liu leads the cast as slightly unnerving mum Rebecca with children Chloe and Tyler and her husband Chris.

Chloe is struggling after the death of her friend Nadia, and senses the Presence in the house. The Presence often lingers in Chloe’s closet, and when Tyler brings over his mate Ryan who is initially sweet towards Chloe but then sinisterly spikes her drink planning to date rape her then the Presence intervenes with haunting phenomenon.

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After a while, Chris rings Julia Fox’s realtor character to confirm if anything bad happened in the house – but she says no. The realtor does however recommend her medium friend come and speak to the family and look over the house. Here’s where it gets really interesting.

The Presence ending explained

The medium explains how something is definitely in the house, and she can feel connected to it through a very old mirror built into the house in the living room. She explains how basically the presence may not even know why it’s there, and how past and present operate differently in the spirit world. Basically, the reason the presence is there may not be known to even the presence yet. Because it might not have happened.

The medium then returns, uninvited, to try and warn the family that something bad is happening and it’s to do with “the window that won’t open”. When Chris and Rebecca leave for the weekend on a trip, Tyler has Ryan round. Tyler drugs Ryan which knocks him unconscious, and goes upstairs to sexually assault Chloe in the same way he tried to previously.

This time, Chloe drinks the drink and Ryan sinisterly reveals he killed Nadia by doing the same thing – and tries to cut off Chloe’s oxygen with a super thin plastic wrap. The presence frantically wakes up Tyler who runs upstairs and pushes Ryan off his sister, but the two of them crash through the window and fall to their deaths.

Everything then clicks into place: The warning from the medium was about that window, and the presence had frequently looked out of it. In the final moments, it’s revealed the presence is Tyler – and Rebecca sees his reflection as the family move out of the home and the presence then moves on from the house after finally achieving what it was trapped on earth to complete.

It’s such a moving ending, and now hopefully with Presence explained those who were a bit cold to it realise it was actually a very great piece of work!

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