History Film / SecretWindow

* NiceHat: Shooter's hat. [[spoiler: It later becomes a ChekhovsGun when it turns out it was actually an hat Mort bought some years ago and confirming that Shooter it was actually Mort's SplitPersonality.]]

* AxCrazy: [[spoiler: Mort when is in his John Shooter persona becomes a vicious and ruthless murderer. He kills his own dog with a screwdriver. He later does the same with Ken Karsch and Tom Greenleaf (also using an hatchet) and finally kills Amy and Ted with a shovel]].

* SplitPersonalityTakeover: [[spoiler:Shooter takes over Mort at the end to murder Ted and May, and claims Mort had destroyed his own personality so he wouldn’t have to live with the guilt. The ending leaves it ambiguous if Shooter was telling the truth, since Mort speaks without Shooter's trademark accent and acts unaware he committed the murders, but his conversation with the sheriff hints that it might be a case of SplitPersonalityMerge.]]

* SparedByTheAdaptation: [[spoiler:Mort in the film.]]

* SmugSnake: Karsch is a rare non-villainous example. He's overly confident that he'll be able to scare off Shooter with ease and never really regards him as a threat, [[spoiler:which proves to be his undoing.]

* NiceHat: Shooter wears one.

* PrivateDetective: Ken Karsch.

* {{Expy}}: Ken Karsch bares a resemblance to Claude Kersek from the 1990s remake of ''Film/CapeFear'', with both being [[PrivateDetective Private Detectives]] who consider themselves savvy in their jobs and are hired by the protagonist to help scare off a psycho who is harassing them, gravely underestimate said psycho and fail to intimidate them, and are [[spoiler:ultimately murdered by the psycho.]]

* SplitPersonalityTakeover: [[spoiler:Shooter takes over Mort at the end to murder Ted and May, and claims Mort had destroyed his own personality so he wouldn’t have to live with the guilt. The ending leaves it ambiguous if Shooter was telling the truth, since Mort speaks without Shooter's trademark accent and acts unaware he committed the murders, but his conversation with the sheriff hints that it might be a case of SplitPersonality!erge.]]

* LineOfSightName: Mort believes that Ted is using this trope, noting that the town Ted comes from has the word "Shooter" in it. [[spoiler: It is revealed that Mort himself was making up parts of Shooter's personality from things in his daily life.]]

* WritersBlock: Mort Rainey suffers from this at the film's opening.

%%* TrademarkFavoriteFood: Mountain Dew and Doritos for Mort. [[spoiler:This has progressed to corn by the end. Yes, this warrants a spoiler.]] {Zero Context Example. Please add more explanation.}

* TheAlcoholic: Mort is implied to be a recovering alcoholic; at one point, Amy pointedly comments that Jack Daniel's was his chief inspiration for the short story "Sowing Season". [[spoiler:When she comes to visit his cabin near the end of the film there's a nearly-empty bottle of bourbon on his coffee table, implying that Mort has fallen OffTheWagon, if indeed he was ever on it.]]

%%* {{Foreshadowing}}: Loads of it.

* KarmaHoudini: [[spoiler:After Mort murders his ex-wife and her lover, he succesfully disposes of the bodies. He continues to live in the town while the locals are terrified of him and gets away with his crimes because the police can't prove anything without solid evidence, but the sheriff makes it pretty clear that he damn well knows what Mort did.]]

* ThroughTheEyesOfMadness

* TrademarkFavoriteFood: Mountain Dew and Doritos for Mort. [[spoiler:This has progressed to corn by the end. Yes, this warrants a spoiler.]]

-> ''"I'm confident I can take care of this business," Tom said, reaching for another ear of corn from the brimming, steaming bowl. "I'm confident that in time, all of her will be gone, and her death will be a mystery... even to me."''

--> "I'm confident I can take care of this business," Tom said, reaching for another ear of corn from the brimming, steaming bowl. "I'm confident that in time, all of her will be gone, and her death will be a mystery... even to me."
'''CHOMP'''

----

* Big-lippedAligatorMoment: Mort dreams of almost failing off a cliff into the sea.

* RoomFullOfCrazy: "SHOOTER ... SHOOTER ... SHOOTER ... [[spoiler: SHOOT HER]]"

* WritingAboutYourCrime: [[spoiler: {{Inverted}}. Mort murders two people and disposes of the bodies exactly as it happens in the story he had written.]]

* {{Adorkable}}: Mort, as demonstrated (only) when the audience gets a brief glimpse of what Mort was like before the divorce.

''Secret Window'' is a 2004 PsychologicalThriller, starring Creator/JohnnyDepp, Creator/JohnTurturro, Creator/MariaBello, Creator/CharlesSDutton, Creator/TimothyHutton, and Creator/LenCariou. It was written and directed by David Koepp, based on the novella ''Secret Window, Secret Garden'' by Creator/StephenKing, collected in ''Literature/FourPastMidnight''.

* {{Foreshadowing}}: Loads of it.

''Secret Window'' is a 2004 PsychologicalThriller, starring Creator/JohnnyDepp, Creator/JohnTurturro, Creator/MariaBello, Creator/CharlesSDutton, and Creator/TimothyHutton. It was written and directed by David Koepp, based on the novella ''Secret Window, Secret Garden'' by Creator/StephenKing, collected in ''Literature/FourPastMidnight''.

''Secret Window'' is a 2004 PsychologicalThriller, starring Creator/JohnnyDepp, Creator/JohnTurturro, Creator/MariaBello, Creator/CharlesSDutton, and Creator/TimothySutton. It was written and directed by David Koepp, based on the novella ''Secret Window, Secret Garden'' by Creator/StephenKing, collected in ''Literature/FourPastMidnight''.

''Secret Window'' is a 2004 PsychologicalThriller, starring Creator/JohnnyDepp and Creator/JohnTurturro. It was written and directed by David Koepp, based on the novella ''Secret Window, Secret Garden'' by Creator/StephenKing, collected in ''Literature/FourPastMidnight''.

* DreamSequence

* {{Foreshadowing}}

* MadArtist: [[spoiler: the main character turns out to be a mad artist (of the 'mystery writer who acts out his own story' type) with SplitPersonality]].

* UnreliableNarrator: The narrator is stalked by a psychopath who accuses him of plagiarizing his book, and who attempts to frame him for several heinous crimes. In the climax, it is revealed that [[spoiler:the narrator has been driven to madness over his guilt for plagiarizing a classmate in college, and is unconsciously committing the acts for which he thinks he's being framed. The stalker does not exist outside his own mind (although the novella hedges a bit on this point)]].