There probably are movies with a more ludicrous "twist" out there, but at the moment at least I can't think of any. The idea that a face as disfigured as Berenger's in the beginning can be restored to look as smooth, is unbelievable in itself, but the fact it's made to look like a spitting image of another man, is taking the bullsh-t onto an altogether outlandish level. And, yeah, then there is Hoskins - whose "comic relief" character was kind of out of place to begin with - with his supposed "aqualung" Shattered is very much a plot driven movie and thusly, despite some moody direction and reasonable amount of suspense before the final act, such utter absurdities DO matter - a great deal.
"facts are stupid things" - Ronald Reagan

Wow. You folks sure have spent a lot of time and effort to deconstruct a movie that no-one has seen, will probably never see; and, never come HERE to read about it. Congratulations on wasting all that time!
I enjoyed the movie. Reminded me of a Hitchcock flick. The ending was no dumber than 80% of EVERY MOVIE I've ever seen.
Son, you can't polish a turd

I guess I'm just surprised how many people watched this multiple times. I fell asleep to this last night and I came here just so I didn't have to watch it again.
"I watch a lot of movies" - Me.

The leap of faith could have worked if the protagonist had a mutilated face from the accident. No plastic surgery could have reconstructed someones real face like that, let alone transform it from a strangers face. This is in the same universe as Face/Off.
The film was still entertaining.

My main point is that despite what we saw on film, his face really was totally disfigured. We have to assume that. The movie-makers couldn't show us that because it would give-away the ending.

It's a catch-22. You could make it more believable by showing his face more deformed and scarredbut that would totally give away the ending. They showed his face totally deformed at the beginning, so much so that it was surprising he ever looked normal again. Well I guess he really didn't. That's good enough for me - good movie!

Everyone loves to claim "I figured it out!" like they want a medal or something. I saw it in theaters and remember NOT TRYING to figure it out. Just go with it. It's upon multiple viewings that it becomes more ludicrous. I'll take my turn:

1. If Judith paid off Klein, why not remove all evidence of his services from Dan's work office? How did she even know of Klein? Who's dumb enough to not use a Kinko's fax machine and not her husband's?
2. Dan borrows the maid's car so Judith won't noticing him following her? Wouldn't she also recognize the maid's car???? Why was Judith driving so erracitcally? What was the point of her speeding and cutting across lanes if there was nothing to be rushed to?
3. Why is this toxic ship sitting there for 9 months?
4. Why fire shots to "scare you"?; Judith is one hell of a stunt driver.
5. The performances were fine, except for Kilmer, she sleptwalked through the whole thing. Though the New Year's flashback at the end was painfully overacted. Why they all decided to talk like they were in a soap opera is beyond me.
6. The voice thingwell, you'd need a an extra 20 minutes of start to show us Merrick before the accident. Then you could alter his voice and say the accident effected his speech, I donno.
   They didn't think we were stupid. It's called stretching credibility in order to make the film last. They knew of the countless fruck ups in the screenplay (Peterson adapted the book himself) but they just had to laugh it off to get to the big payoff. Which was great ("I'm holding my own dead body!"), but hardly enough to save all the contrivances.
   "If I had ya where I wanted ya, they'd be pumpin your ass full of formaldehyde!"

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Who cares? Its a movie and a work of fiction. Its supposed to be ridiculous.

Because our brains work, and we are invited to think as it's a mystery. If the creators didn't want us to think they would have cast Jim Carey in the lead role.

For the convenience of the plot, I'm guessing Dan's parents are dead, and he doesn't have any siblings to visit him (or they all hate him) and notice any changes that might indicate that it's someone else with his face. Blood relatives who saw him grow up might pick up things that friends don't. In 1991, DNA wasn't widely used, so the deception could last longer.

It's a movie. Why does everything have to be so literal?

Good explanation.

To the movie's credit, it does explain a great deal throughout via clues provided that you don't really think about the first time around.
First off, Judith checked herself out of the hospital. That's what Gus tells 'Dan' at his office. Even if the hospital wanted to keep her, they couldn't force her to stay if she didn't require immediate medical attention, which she didn't.
Second, there are subtle clues throughout the movie that indicate 'Dan' has changed. The concierge at the Hacienda notes that 'Dan' looks thinner. Jenny - who was noted to be a semi-Astrologist of sorts - looks at 'Dan's' palms funny shortly before she's murdered. Gus, despite vividly remembering the case and it's specific details that Dan hired him for, didn't immediately recognize 'Dan' when he went to the pet shop to ask him about the invoice.
Third, if someone is 6'4" and someone else is 6'3", are you really going to notice the difference between the two, or would you assume both are relatively the same height? Generally speaking Jack and Dan could have been a mere inch or two apart in heigth, if they weren't exactly the same height, anyway, and no one would have really noticed the difference.
Fourth, as far as 'smell'generally speaking your smell would be determiend by the types of soaps and cologne one uses. Considering Jack was living Dan's life using Dan's items, he could have smelled like Dan easily and no one would have been the wiser. Besides, outside Judith and Jenny, would anyone really pay attention to Dan's smell THAT much?
FifthJack had amnesia and presumably brain damage, thus explaining away any differences between he and Dan in mannerisms and even speech patterns.
Sixththere would have been no need to do a blood test or a fingerprint analysis since no one ever assumed 'Dan's' identity was in question until well after he had been released from the hospital. His identification was in the pocket of his jacket, and his wife didn't deny it was her husband when questioned.
Now, the only thing that can't really be explained logically or conclusively is the actual voice itself. The movie seems to indicate that Dan and Jack had a near identical voice, which most know is impossible because although one can sound like somebody else, speech is almost as distinct as a fingerprint. I can't really comment on some of the explanations provided, because I don't know how a voice can completely change unless damage is done to it, and there was no indication that was the case.
As far as the doctors being able to tell the difference in muscle and structure between Jack and Danperhaps. Then again, tissue and muscle were clearly badly damaged and I'm sure he broke bones everywhere, making any kind of recognition difficult. One could also assume that 'Dan's' restructured face wasn't perfect by any stretch, and people didn't question it because they figured any differences were the result of the surgery, and not him being a completely different person.

All of you that talk about how these flaws ruined the WHOLE movie are looking way too deep into it. I figure only SURGEONS would actually cringe at the Dan Merrick we got after his surgery, not CASUAL VIEWERS. Other than these so-called "glaring errors", the rest of the flaws were not enough to deter it's entertainment value. It's no Citizen Kane, but it's a nice thriller.
I spent my entire childhood growing up. What a waste.

I just watched this movie and the wife said that Jenny was starting to figure out that something was different that's why she killed her. So it's not like no one noticed. I agree with you on the voice but that could be explained by damage done to his vocal cords in the accident.

Sure, you have to kinda take this film with a grain of salt, but at the same time I don't think you can go so far as to say it's absurd. I know people that have had major surguries and been hospitalized for months and when it's all said and done they are a completely different person. My grandpa is a perfect example of this.
Before his stroke he was a 250pd full of energry tough as nails farmer, after open heart surgery and a 6mnth hospital stay you wouldn't even recognize the guy, and yes, his voice was different, his mannerisms were different, he most definitely was not the "same" person, but I never doubted his identity, nor did anyone else.
In this film you have to remember he was in rehab for a long time and Judith forbid anyone to see him in all that time, so I don't think it's unrealistic at all that people would believe he was Dan Merrick, any difference's could just be chalked up to what had happened to him.

Just one problem. You've based your ENTIRE "absurdities" theory on his voice. Now, if this was just some guy trying to pass, it might hold a little water, however, this was a man who had been in a major auto accident. He was in a coma. He had amnesia trust me, your voice can be damaged by life support equipment, being atrophied through non-use, or physically in the accident. On top of that HIS WIFE SAID IT WAS HIM (this is key). He looked just like him. And, to finish it all up, he actually believed that HE was Merrickso he never acted suspicious, and, as I mentioned, his WIFE said it was him. It's very likely no one would question it as long as she didn't have a problem with it. Plus, if you're going to claim someone isn't who they claim to be (who looks exactly like who they say they are), it pretty much behooves you to tell everyone who they actually are, and what the reason is for the charade. To claim someone isn't who they claim, simply based on their voice being a little different, when they look exactly like the guy and his wife claims it's him would probably set you up for people wondering just how nuts YOU are.
However, doing anything that would require fingerprinting would definitely be his downfall.

No American Hospital can keep an adult against their will.

quote:
2) The wife's just committed murder and is desperately anxious to cover it up by creating a paper trail that shows Jack left town. Why, then, would she send an obviously traceable fax from a machine that could only be accessed from her husband's office, on a day when no one else would be in?
reply:
Because she slipped up! All killers make one mistake that allows them to get caught, eventually, at least in the movies.

Amen, but you forgot some other absurdities:

1. No American hospital would have released in three hours a woman who had just survived a car crash of that magnitude and had her husband there in critical condition. They would have kept her to watch for shock, if nothing else. In fact, with such minor-looking injuries, she might still be in the emergency room at dawn, waiting for a few stitches.
2. The wife's just committed murder and is desperately anxious to cover it up by creating a paper trail that shows Jack left town. Why, then, would she send an obviously traceable fax from a machine that could only be accessed from her husband's office, on a day when no one else would be in?
3. The detective (who we have no reason to doubt) reports that the hospital doctors don't believe the facial injuries could possibly be the result of the crash alone, but this discrepancy is not explained by the final reconstruction of events.
   Yeah, the gimmick is surprising, but the logic doesn't hold up at all, which invariably ruins movies of this type for me no matter how well they are acted. The best you can normally hope for is that the movie's logic holds up until the second viewing. Mystery/thrillers like "The Usual Suspects", the plots of which are as perfectly constructed as a Swiss watch and survive three or four viewings, are rare. But you definitely don't want to be scratching your head and picking the thing apart before the credits roll the first time.

In the book Tom Berenger's character's voice is different because he suffered a fractured windpipe in the crash. He mentions it sounds to him like 'gravel poured down a galvanized pipe'. In the movie Tom Berenger sounds like Tom Berenger but maybe the voice we hear is different than both Dan's and Jack's (though if that was the case you'd think the filmmakers would think to mention it)? I don't know. I read the book because, like you, I liked the set-up but thought the end was weak. The other stuff like personality and mannerisms being different doesn't seem like it would be odd bc he did suffer amnesia after a horrific accident. And that would also explain his lack of architectural knowledge.

Good twist but the face change and same voice totally ruined it! Even if the wife gave doctors a picture of him to reconstruct his face they would notice that his skull/muscle features would be different. Accident and memory loss victims can have different personalities and/or mannerisms. So that didn't bother me.
Loved 'Gus' character except when he uses the inhaler as a SCUBA. If I were shot, I'd be screaming and thrashing not thinking rationally and pretending to be dead while using my inhaler.
CacaPoopooDoodie
For a good part of this movie, it simply is a beautiful neo-noir. Casting, location, atmosphere - it's all there. However, I cannot get past the absolutely ridiculous ending that
has us believe that Dan Merrick is actually Jack Stanton. Merrick goes back to work, goes to see Jenny, the interaction with Klein, all of this and NOBODY seems to notice that "Dan Merrick" has a different voice. A different personality. Different mannerisms. On and on and on. The writer(s)/director thought that by just changing the FACE, they could pull off a believable thriller. No way. It ruined the entire movie and is one of those that implies the audience must be brain dead to fall for all of that. Just a little bit of thought - and you realize you have been HAD. First 1/2 of the movie is an A. The second half (and especially the last quarter): F

Yeah, but how could anyone NOT figure out the ridiculous ending? I would think most people would have it figured ut 20 minutes into the movie. I like everyone else have it figured out already. It was just a fun popcorn movie seeing how they would get to the end that was pretty obvious to me.
Walter Sobchak: Smokey, this is not 'Nam. This is bowling. There are rules.