Spoiler alert! We’re discussing important plot points and the ending of “Death of a Unicorn” (in theaters now) so beware if you haven’t seen it yet.

Paul Rudd has played dead onscreen before but never while laying on top of a unicorn puppet.

In the climax of the comedic horror film “Death of a Unicorn,” Rudd’s character dies and is placed on top of a magical foal’s corpse, and both are then resurrected by the baby unicorn’s horned parents. After having his eyes closed for most of the time while filming the admittedly “cool” scene, Rudd got a kick out of seeing it come together in the final cut.

“When the unicorn grabs me by the shoulder and drags me over, the thing that I remember thinking is like, ‘Wow, that really looks good,’ because I was on some sort of cardboard thing that they had to pull with ropes,” Rudd says.

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In “Death of a Unicorn,” recently widowed attorney Elliot (Rudd) and his estranged daughter Ridley (Jenna Ortega) take a trip to a nature preserve in the Canadian Rockies, where Elliot hopes to reconnect with his kid and also has a business meeting with a wealthy pharmaceutical clan. On the way, Elliott hits a baby unicorn with his rental SUV, wounding it, and Ridley touches its horn and forms a trippy spiritual connection with the creature.

They put it in the vehicle to reach the Leopold family’s estate and when it tries to escape, the foal is shot and killed. Elliot and the Leopolds figure out that the unicorn’s blood and shavings from its horn have miraculous medicinal properties, for everything from teen acne to cancer. The Leopolds intend on selling it as a cure-all to the rich and elite but the unicorn parents show up and gruesomely slaughter the Leopolds and their staff one by one.

Rudd and Ortega break down the movie’s ending and the aftermath for their characters.

What happens in the ending of ‘Death of a Unicorn’?

Ridley tries to warn her dad that what’s going on isn’t right, and Elliot finally realizes it late in the game, when the entitled and very bro-y Shepard Leopold (Will Poulter) uses Ridley and the dead foal as bait to capture the other unicorns. After Elliot and Shepard trade stab wounds – Elliot with the baby’s horn, Shepard with a knife – one of the unicorns fatally kicks Shepard in the face and sends him flying, but Elliot succumbs to his injuries. That is, until he’s placed on top of the baby unicorn, the parents lock horns and bring Elliot and the baby back to life, giving Elliot his own magical experience like his daughter’s.

“I love that the unicorns are a metaphor for our planet and the way that we treat (it) and how disrespectful and ignorant we as a species can be at times,” Ortega says of the film’s ending. “It’s really sweet the way Ridley and Elliot come together at the end and see how much they need each other. And more than anything, I was taken by how impactful the love and vulnerability is and how we all could use a bit more of that.”

Rudd adds: “They both get to a place that they’ve been desperate to get to and probably wouldn’t have had this insane venture not happened to them.”

Ortega appreciates how the film tackles the parent-kid dynamic, especially in regard to “a time in a person’s life where they become an adult and the relationship with their parents either gets distant or confused or muddled, and nobody really knows what it means anymore.”

Does ‘Death of a Unicorn’ have a post-credits scene?

It doesn’t, but the movie’s final scene is pretty epic: When the cops come and find the gory carnage at the Leopolds’ estate, they stick Elliot and Ridley in the back of a police cruiser after not buying their “unicorns did this” explanation. On the way to the station, Elliot and Ridley see all three unicorns running free right next to them, they get the hint from the creatures that they’re wanting to help, and dad and daughter brace for a collision as the creatures run the vehicle off the road in an apparent rescue attempt.

While we don’t see what happens next, Ortega imagines that our heroes go on their merry way. “I don’t think they stay close to the unicorns. The unicorns are probably tired of them and want to go back to their cave. And quite frankly, I relate to that,” she says. “I would like to think they did each other solid favors and then kind of just silently agree to never speak or see each other again.”

The response makes Rudd laugh. “It’s inherent in all of us, isn’t it?” he adds. “From the very get-go of when we first formed as a species, we’re all just really trying to get back to our caves.”