What happens to exposed film while rewinding?

Question:

What happens to exposed film while rewinding?

Okay..so I'm taking this photography class and I was supposed to take at least one roll of film over the weekend. Yesterday, I went to downtown LA and shot a whole roll of film and came back home to rewind it. I'm using a manual camera, that requires manual rewinding. As I was rewinding my film, I heard the click that usually signals that the film is done rewinding.

As I opened the camera to check my roll of film, to my surprise there was still some of my film left in it!! and it was exposed to some light. I quickly closed my camera and proceeded to rewind the rest of the film.

Will I be able to save the other pictures that weren't exposed? or does this mean that my whole roll is exposed now?

Best Answer - Chosen by Asker: If you heard the click then you probably heard the leader portion come off the take up spool and then you stopped rewinding before it was wound into the canister. There is a good chance you have lost nothing. That part of the film was already ruined when you loaded the camera.

On the other hand, and in rare cases, the film may have snapped in two for some reason. The take up spool may have jammed for some reason and your rewinding put great stress on the film causing it to snap. But that takes alot of pressure to do that. You would have had to really rewind hard to the point it hurt your fingers to do so for it to break it. You would still have seen film on the take up spool even after you finished rewinding if this was the case. I think you are probably safe.