It looked to me that Steven exiled himself to sunny Spain.

I remember seeing the film in France when it came out and the ending was a little different. There was a shot of Ibiza, Spain in introduction, and the rest was the same, except for a brief shot of Irons in the sun at the beginning.

I agree with someone said that is Tunise or Morocco,

1. those who said 'South of France makes more sense for the story', probably forget that these two countries are French colonies. they have very close relationship to France, so it makes sens for the story too.
2. south of France doesn't look like that, neither Italy, of course not Paris.

I have not read the book. I can only tell you what I think the meaning is.
The photo at the end of the movie is of Anna, Martin and Stephen. Anna stands in the center and stares straight ahead into space so her eyes are connecting with the viewer. Martin is standing to her right and gazing affectionately at his fiance, Anna. Stephen is standing to her left, and
he is definitely looking at his son, Martin
.
The picture was taken, based on the clothing they are wearing, when the family was together in the country just before Martin announces that he has proposed and that Anna has accepted. So the photo is a frozen moment before the loss, when the tragic "end" begins and everything unravels. She can remain his lover, but when she accepts Martin's proposal, Anna becomes unattainable to Stephen in a different way. (For most of us, we see those pivotal moments as having to do with the consequences of our actions and choices; Stephen's is out of his control because it has to do with the actions of his son and of his lover. Remember Stephen talking to Martin about passion and saying "there are things you can't control"?)
So I don't think Stephen uses the photo to deliberately punish himself. It represents that last moment of happiness when his future was still mutable and his dream of truly being with Anna was still possible, and he longs to recapture it. It's the "Glory days". It can also never be realized, so there is unintentional punishment. He can't ever have it, but how can he bear to part with it?
At the end of the film, he sits and stares, and the the camera reveals how narrow his focus has become. He doesn't see the three of them together, or himself, or Martin. He only sees Anna. So, the picture is of that last moment, and he is focused on Anna. It is of the son he lost, and perhaps killed, and he is focused on her. At the center of that moment, she can symbolize loss, ruin, happiness, pleasure, or the unattainable. She is also the one looking out at the viewer, and her eyes do connect with you, so maybe he is trying to recreate the feeling when he felt connected to her before it all fell apart.
In the final voice-over Stephen says he accidentally saw Anna again and "she was no different from anyone else". Perhaps he stares at Anna in the photo trying to ascertain what was so special about her back then. Maybe he realizes that he is the one that has changed, and he mourns the part of himself that saw her as magical.
The final seconds reveal the amazing nature of the movie.
When you watch the film, or share it with someone else, make sure it is watched in complete darkness.
The last thing you see is the fade-out on Anna's face in the photo. In the blackness, you will see the glowing
Afterimage or Burn-in
of her face. Depending on your mood, you may feel Anna's face and eyes are burned into your mind's eye, giving you the feeling that you have some idea of what Stephen is seeing or feeling. (One of my friends said he saw a skull and another a devil, hence the comment about the viewer's mood).

Hi there, I've just read your interpretation of the final scene in Damage(1992) and I couldn't help but ask of you to give me more insight on it. I really love this movie because I relate with it so much! Especially with the character Stephen. So, if it's not asking too much, please elaborate just a little on your interpretation, the guilt and the prisioner part especially.
PS: Don't worry, I'm not a criminal of any kind.

It could be a symbol of his guilt of losing the two people who meant the most in his life. The guilt is making him human, just like a prisoner needs the guilt of not going insane as an innocent being. That of course if he/she is guilty.

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I think the huge blow-up photo represented Stephen's penance. By looking at it regularly he would never forget what he had done. Wherever he was walking at the end of the movie, it was definitely in some Catholic country.

Bklyn4ever, that is a very elegant analysis of the film in terms of Faust thanks. I also noticed a great post of yours on another thread here that gave good Freudian analyses of the characters.
That is the thing I love most about a really fine movie like a great book, a great film can be analyzed from several different angles. This film provokes thought; it makes me watch it again whenever IFC shows it, so that I can think about other ways of interpreting the themes. Close scrutiny is rewarded.
I thought perhaps the location at the end was Venice. But France probably makes more sense, since they had a kind of history in France together, and he would of course place himself "at the end of his Odyssey," as you put it (but without his Penelope!), where he could be closest to her in some way or other.
What, to me, is so perfect and painful about the ending is that it is the three of them on the wall that he stares at, not a picture of her only.

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I agree that at the end he is content to love Anna from afar, but this afar it's not a distance in space. When he said that he's seen her one last time at an airport, he also stated that "she was no different from anyone else". The Anna he still loves is removed in time, the one in the photo, in the memory of his overwhelming passion, blotting out everything, as the image of her face blotted out everything in the final zoom.

very very well said. thank you
-Collini, out!!!

BRILLIANT!!!!!!!!!!

I remember reading the final location is the old quarter of a French mediterranean port city. Someplace near Marseilles but not as big. The geographic location is not as important as the meaning of the place in cultural terms. It could just as easily be a Greek, Italian or Spanish Mediterranean city.
The Mediterranean is the cradle of European civilization. Hence, Stephen has found his "eternity" there. He will spend the rest of his life gazing upon the his beloved's face (echoes of Dante). She is his Faustian "Eternal Feminine." Faust is also one of the central myths of European/Western civilization. Faust cannot be content with reality but must always strive for the Ideal, even if that hurts everyone he knows. The literary Faust causes the suicide of his first love, Gretchen. In this reworking of Faust, it is his son who unintentionally kills himself, then the wife inflicts very painful self damage because of the emotional turmoil Stephen/Faust has caused her. But the conclusion is strangely harmonious, in that he is content to love Anna from afar, while she has gone on with her life and possibly gotten over her "damage" because of the trauma she went through with Stephen and Martyn. In other words, the destructive impulses have been purged. The Mediterranean is a good a setting for the end of this Odyssey.

"The word "love" is never mentioned"

• ummm yeah it is. When they meet in the doorway in Paris he says to her "I love you", clearly it's an obesession, but he does say it.

The reason those scenes make us fidgety is that they
aren't
love scenes. The word "love" is never mentioned. They barely kiss. I can't even really use the word "passion" to describe what Stephen and Anna feel. It's an obsession more for him than her. He couldn't put a label on his feelings if he had to; he just wants to "put them in some kind of order." Having sex with Anna becomes the only reason for Stephen's existence. He fills a smaller space in her life, but when they come together it is for the same reason.
The only time Stephen and Anna are happy together is the last time. She has made the kind of preparations food, drink, flowers that you make for a date. She's never had occasion or time to do this before. (In the book this scene is set the day before her wedding to Martyn, which makes it very disquieting.)
When Stephen arrives she jumps up to greet him with the biggest smile we've seen on her face yet. He's giddy, too. Everything leading up to the sex unfolds slowly, and is warm, gentle and relaxed. In a strange way, it's possible to feel something close to empathy for them in this scene. Maybe because it's the first time they've behaved like a normal couple. We, of course, know before they do that it will be the last.

I thought it was her and Peter's child but if the child was supposed to be conceived around the time she was sleeping with Stephen it could just as easily be Martyns.

Question, whos "child" do you think Anna was withhis or Peter's?
By the way, I thought the love scenes were so weird and out of place, I felt fidgety myself.

Yes, agreed that's the "damage" done in this film. Every single person involved was damaged by this affair. He's damaged for life now and lost everything dear to him. YET. he is still obsessed with her after all he's lost. It's not normal, you're right it's quite insane, actually. That's why I found the ending so brilliant.

I'm sure you're right, but it's not normal to sit in front of a blown up photo and stare at it all the time. It appears that he has absolutely no life.

I thought the fact he had that photo there for him to see all the time was a way of reminding himself what he had done. I saw it as a form of punishment he was inflicting on himself.

I think the blow up of the photo shows that he's over the edge.

I think it was Paris due to their meeting at the church, he walked past a church or something as well when he was walking to his apartment so maybe..

Thanks so much for that piece of info - It's the only reason I register on
this site.