| Cast: | Jack Nicholson, Shelley Duvall, Danny Lloyd, Scatman Crothers, Barry Nelson, Philip Stone, Joe Turkel, Anne Jackson |
| Genre: | Horror/Thriller |
| Director: | Stanley Kubrick |
| Screenplay: | Diane Johnson, Stanley Kubrick, based on the novel by Stephen King |
| Cinematography: | John Alcott |
| Composer: | Wendy Carlos, Rachel Elkind |
| Runtime: | 146 minutes |
"I can remember when I was a little boy. My grandmother and I could hold conversations entirely without ever opening our mouths. She called it 'shining.' And for a long time, I thought it was just the two of us that had the shine to us. Just like you probably thought you was the only one. But there are other folks, though mostly they don't know it, or don't believe it" - Dick Hallorann
The Shining is based on Steven King's 1977 horror novel about a domestic tragedy involving four people at a giant isolated resort hotel that possess this paranormal psychic power of clairvoyance and telepathy. If nothing else, King's name should mean the writing is decent (and there have been too many cases where we got nothing else, although his non-horrors are generally better written and more easily translated). Apparently Stanley Kubrick's version bares minimal resemblance to the text version, and King is one of the few people who doesn't like this film. That's kind of understandable because the writing is hardly what makes The Shining a standout.
The Shining is a masterpiece of directing. I could tell you what happens in a sentence, yet Stanley Kubrick keeps us on the edge of our seats for almost 2 ½ hours. The pace is slow and insidious, but the film is all about anticipation. That we feel we know what will happen makes the success of the film that much more remarkable because we are never sitting there bored waiting for the action. A key reason we are never bored is the expert use of foreshadowing. Virtually every scene is not only an example of a virtuoso filmmaker, but also contains something that will come into play at least once later in the film. It's not only with the dialogue, but the framing, the backgrounds, and the soundtrack. Some things are so subtle, like Danny watching a cartoon that we are able to identify as Roadrunner without ever actually seeing it. Although everything is not a mystery, there are plenty of revelations and startling visions to tide us over until the action, and they don't stop with the action either.
Cinematographer John Alcott has done a great job here. The Shining is a film oozing with style to the point it squeezes out shut elevator doors. It's loaded with lush images and stunning scenic views. The aerial shots are amazing, but what stands out is a scene where Jack (Jack Nicholson) peers into the small replica of the maze. It seems like he sees his wife and son there because there's such a smooth transition from the replica to a God's eye view shot of them in the maze, tracking closer at a minimal pace until we see them in the very center of the maze. I think the scene shows the power he and the house have over the fate of his family. It has several awesome tracking shots with the then brand new Steadicam, particularly of Danny Torrance (Danny Lloyd) riding his tricycle down the hallways of the hotel. Up until the end, Kubrick does a great job of showing the enormity of the place. At that point, he rightfully switches to a claustrophobically filmed chase during a blizzard through the snow-covered maze that through POV shots looks like a snow tunnel. The house has closed in on Jack and the characters are basically out of options, with the chosen ending seeming more plausible outside the hotel since it's powers should not be as great there.
Kubrick has made a horror film, and one the owners of the Timberline Lodge in Oregon where it was filmed felt was so scary that they had the room holding evil secrets changed from 217 (which they have) to 237 (which they don't) because they feared they'd never be able to rent the room again, but this is hardly a genre entry. It forsakes convention, instead building an epic around contradiction. The locations are beautiful at the same time they are desolate and cause the horror. It's a gothic horror that's filmed in broad daylight. The tension is constantly rising even though there's still "no action" taking place. Jack Torrance, mainly, sees what will happen but denies its possibility.
The Shining is much more than a mere haunted house tale. One of the things that makes it so interesting is that it shows a wide variety of elements that lead to Jack's insanity to the point that viewers are divided on whether it really was the house (which is puzzling when you consider the film closes with a shot of Jack, who was "always the caretaker," from the hotel's July 4, 1921 ball). As Jack takes the job of resort caretaker, the Torrance family is forced to live in total isolation for six months during a typically brutal Rocky Mountain winter. Jack doesn't know what he wants from life. He used to be a teacher, but he gave it up because it got in the way of his writing. That would be fine if Jack had any ideas, but he's barren of ideas and his obsession with getting something down on paper has probably given him insomnia. These factors, his dislike and disinterest in his wife, his disdain for his child because she'll never let him live down the time he hurt him, his thirst for alcohol, his inability to deal with his self imposed seclusion, and the grip of the house grow more and more maddening.
Danny doesn't understand his special powers. They began to develop after his father, Jack, abused him. Danny thinks they come from Tony, an imaginary figure that "lives in his mouth" yet only is able to talk (in a rough croaking voice that's reminiscent of some of the scenes where the demon was speaking through Linda Blair in The Exorcist) when Danny wiggles his index figure. Danny doesn't get much beyond torment from his powers because, although they are essentially a defense mechanism for him, Tony has supposedly told him he can't tell anyone (Danny doesn't know anyone else in his family has these powers). Danny doesn't always remember what happens during a vision because he's entranced, but he retains enough to know he doesn't want to live in this house. As Danny grows more lonely and afraid, he retreats totally into the Tony character.
Wendy Torrance (Shelley Duvall) doesn't have much problem with the isolation itself because she asks nothing of life and is at least somewhat oblivious and clueless to what is going on around her. She is the type that you wonder how anyone could marry. She doesn't have much going for her in any department and her mere presence gets under your skin to the point you want to bludgeon her. Actually, she is pretty handy, but not very intelligent, particularly in assuming that everything will come together for Jack once he gets into the habit of writing regularly. Her problems come when she needs to get back to civilization, but is unable to contact anyone or drive out of the mountain.
It's easy to look at the maniacal Jack and say the problems are rooted in his character, but everything is rooted in the isolated haunted house. The film is not about a guy that goes mad because he can't be productive or about a man who tries to kill because his values and priorities are backwards. These are merely effects of the setting, which is why the setting's power increases as Jack's mental capacities and willpower decrease. Even though he has a history of violence and so does the house, theoretically his history of violence is minor (in so far as one act in 40 or so years). At one time or another, everyone has gotten a little out of control and done something they regretted. That doesn't excuse it, but one of the points the movie makes is any man is capable of violence under the "right" circumstances.
The key scenes that show it's the house are when Jack wonders into scenes of the hotels past. First the bar becomes stocked and the bartender Lloyd (Joe Turkel) appears, in a way ending Jack's "5 miserable months on the wagon and all the irreparable harm that it's caused." If you notice, when Wendy enters the room there is no evidence of the supernatural, but Jack is drunk (even though presently there's no alcohol in the house). Now that Jack is metaphysically an alcoholic again, he returns to the bar where, in another scene of the hotels past, he meets the "caretaker" who murdered his family. Delbert Grady (Philip Stone) is working as a waiter though, and he insists Jack has always been the caretaker. This racist warns Jack that his son is more powerful than he realizes. He tells him Danny is trying to bring in a nigger in to interfere with Jack's duty, which is to protect the hotel and correct (brutally murder) his family.
Although the violence in the film occurs between the four main characters, The Shining is rich in symbolism and it's more theoretical. The violence is done by white men and directed toward those they have controlled throughout the years. At one point when Jack has given up trying to produce any material, we see him throwing a ball into the hanging Native American tapestry. There are no "Indians" in the movie, but that's because they were slaughtered by the white men during the building of the resort in the early 1900's. With the natives out of the way, the house (representative of the group of people who act against the "lesser" beings not every white man) only had to worry about correcting women (Wendy and Mr. Grady's wife), children (Danny & Grady's two daughters), and African Americans (Hallorann). The key scene that proves this theory is Jack leaves a black man laying on a Native American design, a bloody combination of the two most persecuted ethnicities in the country's history. Jack is certainly a chauvinistic racist. It's unclear whether these tendencies were passed down from his ancestors or the house, but what matters is they allow him to justify valuing an object (the house) over people's lives, which again goes back to white man's destruction of the Native Americans (manifest destiny and the building of the resort). Ultimately, the child triumphs over the white tyrant because he hasn't been corrupted by the views of that "superior" society yet. He learns from the black man early in the film and uses an ancient Indian trick to outsmart the consumer oriented (representative of a place of great decadence) white man.
The color red is particularly well used. Lloyd wears a red suit with bright red horn shaped lapels when he appears after Jack says, "God, I'd give anything for a drink. I'd give my god-damned soul for just a glass of beer!" We eventually realize that Lloyd works for the devil. A portion of the hallway is also tinted red to represent the blood that once stained the walls. We continually see visions of blood filling the hallways like the corridors of s ship flooding in slow motion, and we are probably supposed to believe this is the "redrum" Danny keeps talking about. A lesser example of symbolism is when Jack yanks his page out because Wendy comes in the room and the typewriter automatically feeds a new blank page in to show he's not in control, the house (which he has a scrap book of next to him) is.
Mirrors are a key to the film. They are present every time Jack talks to a ghost, but luckily such a "secret" isn't the entire movie like it is with the masturbatory mediocrity known as The Sixth Sense. Mirrors are also used for dislocation, like in the scene where Wendy tries to serve Jack breakfast in bed and Jack has his first father-son interaction with Danny. Mainly, they are used to show how the house has made everything backwards.
One of the key themes is violence is "okay" if you've seen it on TV. It starts on the way to the hotel when Jack is telling a story about settlers getting stuck in the mountains and having to resort to cannibalism to stay alive. Wendy complains, but Danny says, "Don't worry, Mom. I know all about cannibalism. I saw it on TV." Jack replies, "See, it's OK. He saw it on the television." When Jack tries to kill his wife, he utters several famous TV lines to justify his actions. Furthermore, Jack's life and death chase of Danny is what Danny sees when he's watching Roadrunner. It's okay for Jack to kill because he sees it on TV.
The acting is characterized by exceptional facial expressions. Danny Lloyd's performance is all about his stares and glares. He creates two distinctly different characters in Danny and the theoretical Tony through his demeanor, intensity, and voice.
We can see that Shelly Duvall is quietly horrified by the way her husband has began to act. She acts all agreeable, but she doesn't believe in or agree with what she says to Jack. We can tell she's distraught and shocked by what's coming out of her husband's mouth. The thing with her character is that she purposely doesn't make us feel sorry for her. She is purposely a bland, gawky, whimpering, lame housewife so we don't like her too much. The argument over her is that her acting is either so bad she's perfect for the part or so good that she seems bad because her Wendy is so irritating and annoying to watch. I have a distinct feeling that Duvall is not the type of person I'd like to be around for long periods of time, but the argument whether it's acting or her is irrelevant because whatever it is works perfectly for the Wendy character.
There's little disagreement over Nicholson's performance because you have to hate all over the top performances to be impressed by this. It's quite simply one of the most memorable performances of all-time. I don't even know where to begin. It's hardly what he says, but the way his voice and look give meaning to the material. He does so much with his eyes (which among other things show the eternal madness, zombie-esque sleepless stare, and emptiness caused by the house's theoretical lobotomy) and eyebrows to add to his increasingly unkempt and disheveled look. He does so much with his body language to show his anger, frustration, suffering, possession, madness, and rage. He grows increasingly creepy, scary, and insane, but you can always kind of see his point of view and understand it. That doesn't justify his actions because he always handles things poorly if not inhumanly, but I know full well that someone coming in and talking to you while you are writing is usually a setback. Also, even though a child's health and well being is more important, I can understand his argument for staying at the resort. "Have you ever had a single moment's thought about my responsibilities? Have you ever thought for a single solitary moment about my responsibilities to my employers? Has it ever occurred to you that I have agreed to look after the Overlook Hotel until May the first? Does it matter to you at all that the owners have placed their complete confidence and trust in me, and that I have signed a letter of agreement, a contract, in which I have accepted that responsibility? Do you have the slightest idea what a moral and ethical principle is, do you? Has it ever occurred to you what would happen to my future if I were to fail to live up to my responsibilities? Has it ever occurred to you? Has it?" This is all said as he's about to kill his wife. At this point, he's totally lost it and essentially become the devil incarnate, with a frizzled look and a satanic grin we feel just how much he's reveling in terrorizing his potential victims. That said, he's so entertaining, more and more so as he descends deeper, that you can't help but like him some. Jack is both protagonist and antagonist. He's never what you'd call good, but in many ways he's the least annoying character and the only true villain in the movie is the house. That said, the surprising resourcefulness shown by Duvall's character in the later stages drives home the feeling that we've underestimated her.
The ominous soundtrack is so amazing. It always makes you at least a little edgy and uneasy, but it does it with so many different instruments, effects, layers, and textures. Take the first scene where Danny is riding his tricycle down the hall for example. There's a wooden floor on one side and a carpet on the other, so we alternately get the very different sound riding over each of them makes. This combination of sounds enhances our feeling that he's going to see some apparition as we track him around each corner, but Kubrick is not immediately predictable. One of the main themes is essentially just one key played over and over again, but the tone and the pace of the note make it eerie. There's much more technical stuff involving mixes of strings, chords, keys, and environmental sounds, but mainly it sticks to basic stuff, as the complexity doesn't translate into reaching the same level of creepiness.
In the end, the film equates the theatre audience to the Overlook Hotel crowd. If you pay attention to the credits, you'll notice the 1921 audience applauds after their song ends and then begins to chitter chatter. This is the same thing that happens at the theatre if the film is good (so it's happening less and less these days). The point of it though is that we can all be witnesses to violence, in the presence of killers, and it's even possible if the circumstances are wrong for us to be that killer. Obviously, we aren't really going to believe the metaphysical aspects of the story like Jack looking virtually the same (a little younger) in 1921, but the point is evil has always been present in some form. We must keep our guard up and minimize the potential for it in ourselves.
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