Question: What differentiates the End of Mort story from the Shooter story? I mean, Mort adapts Shooter's story in the end, in which Amy is killed and buried in the garden, so what was the ending that Mort wrote in the book and magazine before John Shooter's "Perfect Ending"?
Question: What's the point of the braces?
Answer: Mort had some problem with his jaw and eventually got braces to help correct it. I also read that it was Johnny Depp's idea for Mort to get braces, believing it added an interesting facet to his character.
Answer: As read in previous answers the jaw aches came about because of his imagination of Shooter. Shooter is taking over Mort's personality, throughout the movie it progressively gets worse and worse until the end where Shooter finally gets through to Mort and takes over. The braces are now a sign that Mort can no longer hold back Shooter, and it's shown because the braces stop the mannerism. (Shooter is the sole personality and no longer needs to push his way out, thus the need for braces and no more pain). He finally got his way. The true ending.
Answer: If you recall, Mort was kicked in the mouth after he had stabbed his wife in the leg. I'm thinking braces were the result.
Question: What was the point of Mort accusing himself as Shooter for stealing the story? Did Mort write the story the first time during a breakdown also contributing why the story is written under Shooter's name; so, he didn't even realise originally wrote the story? How did Mort just find a copy of the manifesto lying around his house? And why would Morts alter ego want reconciliation years after Morts copy was published? Was it because of Amy's affair triggering the breakdown thus releasing Shooter?
Answer: Shooter was an alter ego created by Mort. When he catches his wife cheating, he had brought a gun to kill them. But doesn't end up doing it. Thus, Morts psychosis breaks. Shooter emerges. Notice how Mort is always taking naps. That's when Shooter takes over and does the deeds that Mort couldn't. You hear shooter say he took the cowards way out. But at the end, the accent gone, and he's all confident and happy again. Cause Shooter did what Mort couldn't do. Finishing the story was more about fulfilling his obligation towards killing the two.
Question: When Mort is talking to himself and figures out that he is John Shooter, he looks to the side and yells/makes an odd noise. It almost looks like he's calling out to something. Why did he do that?
Answer: Johnny Depp said he based it on the noises made by his toddler, who could not yet speak words. The idea behind this was that, confronted with the realization that he is Shooter, Mort would regress into a toddler-like state of confusion.
Question: In the short story, Fred Evans (from the assurance company) fatally shoots Mort while Mort tries to kill Amy. Amy marries Ted. Does anyone know why this was changed? Has Stephen King commented on it?
Answer: One reason was that the filmmakers wanted a more "realistic" ending. In the story (SPOILER ALERT), it is revealed that Shooter is in fact real, a supernatural manifestation borne from Mort's mind (à la The Dark Half). To keep the film grounded, it was changed in the film to Shooter being all in Mort's mind, a symptom of his split personality disorder.
In addition to your answer, I think the movie version makes the audience feel more sympathy for Mort. Amy is more "at fault" for having the affair with Ted. In the book, Mort considers how the marriage had issues before Ted. He wonders if his relationship with Amy never really "existed" anyway.
Answer: Movies often change details to achieve a different effect and/or add an element of surprise. In this case, it was to streamline the ending, giving it an unexpected dark twist and a sad fate for the victims which erases any sympathy for Mort's situation and his mental illness. Movies tend to like shock value and more gruesome scenes. It also leaves open whether or not Mort will ever be proved guilty.
I know that movies often have changes from the books - it's why I asked the question in the first place. I was wondering if anyone knew the specific reason behind this particular change.
Question: How did the pages of the magazine go missing? It did not seem like he switched to Shooter in between.
Answer: Mort removed the pages without realizing it. He believed Shooter had somehow got hold of the package, opened it, and tore out the pages before he picked it up at the post office. It wasn't shown on-camera that it was Mort who did that, as that would have spoiled the "big reveal" at the end of the movie. The audience is seeing it from Mort's perspective.
Question: Why is there a Barbie doll on Mort's desk in the final scene in the house?
Answer: The Barbie doll is blonde, like Amy. Mort might have found the doll somewhere and handled it roughly because of his urge to hurt Amy.
Answer: One possible answer is that this may be an inside joke and a nod to Johnny Depp for being a Barbie Doll collector. He reportedly has a large Barbie collection, mostly of special editions and celebrity versions. He originally bought them for his daughter, but continued collecting even after she became older.
Question: How did the Waitress at the breakfast place not see Tom, Ken, or Mort at 9am and say nothing of Mort having been in there earlier? Ken and Mort were scheduled to surprise Tom at breakfast, so Tom would have already had been inside at the time when both Ken and Mort would have interrogated him.
Answer: Mort, as Shooter, would have intercepted Ken and Tom and convinced them to go to his secluded property. Also, Mort didn't go to the store at 9. He slept past 10 am.
Question: Why did the inside of his cabin look like a tornado hit it, was the maid at the beginning just another one of his hallucinations?
Answer: More than half of the movie was through Mort's perspective so to him it wasn't that dirty and I think the maid was real but mabey hadn' t been there for a while then you can see the house through Amy's perspective, near the end of the movie.
Answer: Towards the end, the townspeople had shunned Mort and refused to provide him with any services, believing he killed Amy and the others. The maid was real and probably quit for the same reason and likely feared working for a suspected murderer. Mort, dysfunctional and sinking eve further into madness, was unconcerned about keeping a tidy house.
The townspeople didn't shun him until Amy, Ray and Ken disappeared. His slow descent into madness preceded that. I think she was a figment of his imagination as he slowly goes mad. Or, he fired her because he didn't want anyone bothering him.
Answer: Since Amy was the one to walk in on the mess, that couldn't have been why the housekeeper wouldn't come back. I think she was just in his imagination.
Question: What did the chess set look like in the movie? I seem to remember that it was oversized.
Answer: What chess set?
Question: Why did Mort/Shooter kill Chico the dog? I don't think he wanted to upset Amy, because she never finds out that Chico is dead. She calls his name when she takes the divorce papers to the lake house, where Mort/Shooter kills her.
Answer: "Shooter" (actually Mort), killed the dog as a threat and a warning to Mort, implying this will happen to him if he doesn't cooperate. Mort, as himself, has no recollection of doing this and believed "Shooter" was threatening his life. Mort then reports it to the sheriff, which only fed into his delusion that Shooter was real and shows he's losing his grip on reality. It wasn't about Amy.
Question: What's the back story of Mort and his wife mentioning the previous stalker and how he paid him off? They also mentioned the people who only knew.
Answer: What I find ironic is the fact he tries to fix his teeth with braces hoping to minimize double-personality jaw mimique, while he grows and eats corn in the garden. Corn and braces are one of the worst possible combination in terms of comfort of eating. That was nice spice of absurdity to the story.