Who read the Secret window by Stephen King?

Question

I need help understanding the ending. His ex wife said she thought it was a ghost that left the note in the sweat band or something... anyway, can someone summarize the ending of that book for me?? Thanks!

Answer 1

This review may assist (!!).

Being a huge fan of Stephen King I really wanted to see Secret Window. Secret Window is based on the Stephen King story Secret Window Secret Garden, which I haven't read. It actually looked a little bad to me, but I had loved almost all the Stephen King books I had read in the past and I loved most of the movies, although less then the books. I was also sort of a fan of Johnny Depp. I liked him in Pirates Of The Carribean, Nightmare On Elm St., and Edwardschissor Hands. I ended up renting it one night when I had nothing else to do. Secret Window was o.k., but worse then most of the Stephen King movies I've seen.


Secret Window stars Johnny Depp as Mort Rainey, a writer who lives in a small cottage outside of town. He recently (six months ago) seperated with his wife (Amy) when he found her cheating on him with another guy named Ted. She still lives in their house while Mort moved to the cottage. Although they are basically divorced, Mort hasn't signed the divorce papers.


One day Mort gets a visit from a man who goes by the name John Shooter. John Shooter acts friendly at first, but then acuses Mort of stealing his story and publishing it. John says that Mort even made the story worse, adding a worse ending. Shooter leaves and leaves a copy of his story behind. Mort doesn't attend on reading it, but ends up reading it. The stories are almost alike and Mort starts to question whether he could have somehow stolen the story, although he never remembers doing so.


Soon Mort gets another visit from Shooter. This time Shooter requests that Mort publish his story with his ending and his name and if he doesn't, Shooter will ruin his life. But when Shooter tells Mort that he wrote the story in 1995, Mort is sure he wrote the story first since it was published in a magazine in one of the previous years. When Mort informs Shooter of this Shooter still doesn't believe this and requests to see the magazine. Shooter tells Mort that he has 3 days to get the magazine or else. The only problem is that the magazine is at Amy's house and will have to be sent by mail.


Soon Mort finds his dog killed by Shooter with a screwdriver in it. Nearby is a note that reads "3 days". Soon Shooter is preforming a bunch of horrible deeds and Mort becomes afraid for his own safety. He hires a security guard, but nothing seems to stop Shooter. Shooter preforms a number of horrible deeds and when Mort finally gets the magazine the page with his story is ripped out. Too tell any more would be giving away too much.


As you know already I'm a big Stephen King fan. His stories are ingenious. His writing style is amazing and descriptive. His ideas are really scary. Secret Window was a bit of a let down for me coming from Stephen King. The idea wasn't too original unlike most of his other ideas. It also wasn't a very scary idea or an interesting idea. A strange creature that can form any shape and feasts on children is a cool and somewhat creative idea. A man who slowly gets droven crazy by the ghosts of a haunted hotel is a good idea too. Those are both Stephen King plots in a one sentance summary, and they are really good, but a story about a man who threatens to ruin a guys life because he stole a story isn't great. It's very uncreative. That is a plot anyone could think up. It's not a very scary idea. There's nothing too creepy about that. There is something creepy about monsters that shapeshift and eat children. There's something creepy about a girl who possesses powers that she uses to destroy half her town. Some stupid man stalking a writer isn't very scary. That was my main problem. Coming from Stephen King, the king of horror (don't deney it), I'd acpect a much better idea and I think they should've made a movie off of a better Stephen King story, because although I haven't read the story, I think it was a poor choice.


I also found this movie a little boring. When there was a suspenseful moment it was pretty scary, but there were too few to really keep your attention. A lot of the film was Mort talking to Shooter, Mort talking to his wife, Mort talking to his security guard and mort talking to other various people. Although speech and character development is important, it'd be more exciting if the movie was a little more suspenseful and kept you at the edge of you seat like a good horror movie should. The movie was a little slow and only picked up in the last 20 minutes or so. Although when there was a scary moment it was pretty intense and freaky. They weren't stupid and surprised you, espeically when he found his dog dead. The situations were creepy too, like how Shooter kept getting into his house.


Besides that the movie was pretty good. I really enjoyed the ending. Although I can't compare the movie to the book, I'm guessing the ending was pretty faithul to the book considering like most Stephen King movies, it wasn't corny or really happy. Stephen King's books usually have really sad or scary endings and the movies totally change the endings and make them happy and cheesy, such as It, the new Carrie, and Cujo. The ending to Secret Window was really surprising for me, pretty creepy and not cheesy or happy which I think is important for a horror movie. Most situations in life like that don't end up happy. The ending was one of my favourite parts, although I think there was a small flaw.


The acting was great. I wouldn't say Johnny Depp's best preformance, some of his others were amazing, but Johnny Depp was great in this movie. He really suited the role and I can't imagine anyone playing it better. He was very convincing. Also, John Turroto (I spelled his name wrong, I'm not even sure if that is his name) was amazing as John Shooter. His preformance was better then Johnny Depp's and he was extremely convincing. The other preformances were o.k. Pretty good.


I have heard that Secret Window is predictable. I didn't find it very predictable at all. The ending surprised me a lot. I would've never expected it. Maybe I got to into the film, but I never found anything very predictable. I could never predict it, but that is just me.


Another thing I liked about this film was it was very believable and realistic. Unlike a lot of horror movies these days that are really stupid and extremely gorey, this one actually made an attempt to be good. It wasn't very gorey or gross, and it wasn't really stupid. I find that most horror movies these days are.


Overall Secret Window was o.k. It had good acting, some pretty freaky scenes, a really cool and scary surprise ending, was realistic and wasn't cheesy. Although it did have a pretty bad plot and was a little boring. I wouldn't suggest seeing this movie. There are many other better movies based on Stephen King novels. I only suggest seeing this if you're a die hard Stephen King fan or a die hard johnny Depp fan.