The events of the film Nocturnal Animals are all about Edward's revenge on Susan.

But the end of the book is Edward saying goodbye to his past self and deciding to move on. For Edward, these events were as traumatic as a double murder. She never appreciated his work, never gave their marriage a chance, and then aborted their child while trying to keep him in the dark about it. In Edward's eyes, when Susan left him, she did so mercilessly. The murder of Hastings' wife and child, Laura and India respectively, signify Edward's wrenching grief at how his own wife and child were taken away from him. On a basic level, I think it's clear that Edward's book is about his marriage to Susan. Susan meticulously adjusts her appearance before heading out. The film ends with Susan emailing Edward to set up a dinner meeting at a restaurant. Meanwhile, we also see flashbacks to Susan's first meeting with Edward, her failed marriage with him, and the abortion she had of his child after she left him for another man. While Hastings crawls away from the site where he exacted revenge, he shoots himself by accident. While Hastings eventually kills the man responsible, he ends up injured. In gripping fashion, the movie recreates the events of the book's plot, with Gyllenhaal also playing Tony Hastings, a man whose wife and child are brutally murdered, leading to a quest for revenge against the perpetrators.

When a book titled Nocturnal Animals hits her doorstep from her ex-husband, Edward Sheffield ( Jake Gyllenhaal), Susan quickly reads it until its conclusion. In the main time period, Susan ( Amy Adams) is living in an unhappy marriage and unsatisfied with the art she's putting out into the world (side note: the opening credits sequence of the film gives us a window into the work displayed at Susan's gallery - a striking, ironic celebration of American excess and freedom). Nocturnal Animals cuts back and forth between several narratives.

Nocturnal animals ending meanaing