Angie B's 31 Horror Films in 31 Days Continues With... THE SHINING.
THE SHINING
(1980)
STARRING: Jack Nicholson, Shelley Duvall, Danny Lloyd, Scatman Crothers.
DIRECTED BY: Stanley Kubrick.
RATED: R
"Places are like people, Doc. Some shine... And some don't."
Last night I sat down to watch this for the very first time from start to finish, completely unedited and without pause. I came away feeling as though I'd been (pardon my coarseness) mindfucked in the best possible way. Watching The Shining is akin to falling into a dream -- or perhaps a nightmare -- that is equal parts horrifying and mesmerizing. There are moments that are grotesque and shocking, yes, but there's also a great deal of stylized beauty.
I must confess: I'm in love.
Most everyone knows the basic gist, even if they've never read the book or seen the movie(s), simply because it's been referenced and parodied a hundred times since the 80s. Until I read the book when I was fourteen, my entire mental image of this story was the Simpsons' Treehouse of Terror lampooning -- "No TV and no beer make Homer something something..." -- but a multitude of quotes and images have been copied. You'd be hard put to find someone over the age of ten who hasn't heard "REDRUM!" somewhere before. On the off-chance that you've been kept in the dark: Jack Torrance (Nicholson) has been hired as the winter caretaker for the enormous Overlook Hotel, an isolated monster of a building high in the Colorado mountains. Jack's been having a rough time of it lately -- he's a recovering alcoholic with a temper, who recently lost his teaching position thanks to an outburst against a student -- and is hoping that this new job will help him finish his novel and reconnect with his wife Wendy (Duvall) and small son Danny (Lloyd). Danny's no normal little boy, though -- he's got the gift of "shining", as Dick Hallorann (Crothers) calls it, a psychic and telepathic power that warns him that the Overlook Hotel is a dark and dangerous place. There are violent spirits at the Overlook, and when the winter snows settle in and cut the small family off from the outer world completely, those restless ghosts and Jack's own restless demons begin to conspire against Wendy and Danny.
This film has two incredible things going for it: its style, and its tension. Kubrick was a perfectionist, to the point of hair-pulling and weeping amongst his cast, but his efforts in this film have really produced something worthy of note. You get the sense that every single shot, no matter how quick or seemingly mundane, was painstakingly thought out beforehand. Everything, from the angles to the music to the colours in every scene, contribute to a pervasive and ever-increasing fog of dread -- until the tension alone is enough to make you scream. There are very few scenes that are outright graphic in terms of violence or horror; in fact there's only one on-screen death, and the bloodiest scene is simply of a wave of blood pouring from the elevator. The ghosts themselves aren't even all that frightening -- more unsettling and creepy than terrifying -- though the infamous moment with the twin girls is pretty fucking startling.
Favourite moment in the entire movie? Yes, I think so.
The Hotel is a beautiful place, but there is something slightly and visibly off about it. Perhaps it's simply because it's a huge place almost completely emptied of its usual bustle. Some of us have probably dreamed of the opportunity to have the run of such a fabulous place, a veritable Wonderland all for the taking, but with the Overlook... It's just a bit too ornate, too colourful, too echoing and empty. It's not hard to imagine that such a place is full of demons and ghosts. The Hotel is a character in its own right, practically breathing and whispering to the audience as it whispers in Jack Torrance's ear...
I'm in love with Kubrick's pacing in this, too. At times it feels almost too slow, but that's the point. It's like running through molasses, like being caught up in a suffocating dream, and just when it gets almost unbearable... That's when the insane and unthinkable finally happens. An axe through the door. A beautiful woman revealed to be a rotting corpse. A loving father and husband promising his wife that he's "not gonna hurt you, Wendy Darling". He's just going to bash her brains in. Powerful stuff.
While there are a handful of supporting characters throughout the film, this is really a three-actor show. Little Danny Lloyd does a great job as the psychic Danny, though the six-year-old had no idea he was actually in a horror film until years afterwards. There's an otherworldly air about Lloyd, a sometimes knowing and sometimes confused blankness that only adds to the air of wrongness at the Overlook. Shelley Duvall plays the slowly collapsing and panicked mother convincingly -- though perhaps that's because she always looks moments away from hysterics. I'm not one of Duvall's biggest fans, by any means (I must confess I find her to be rather creepy-looking at the best of times), but I still sympathized with her in this. In the film's opening, she's sweet, bubbly, and cheerful; you get the sense that she's a mother and wife trying to do her best, but who is coming unglued as she realizes that both her son and husband are dealing with things beyond her comprehension. And Jack Nicholson... The man plays devilish, cruel, and batshit like few can. He need only twitch those distinctive eyebrows of his and BAM!, Old Scratch has come to play and his toys are sharp and painful.
Hello, sir, can I help y-- OH SHIT OH SHIT RUN RUN RUNNNN.
It's a widely-known fact that Stephen King and Kubrick didn't fully see eye-to-eye on this project, and I can see both points of view on this matter. King's biggest complaint lay in the casting -- he thought Duvall and Nicholson were the exact opposite of what the roles called for. He'd always seen Wendy as a peppy cheerleader-type, who had never had to deal with huge problems in her life. This would make her breakdown and difficulties at the Overlook even more poignant and serious; the fact that such a unprepared woman could rally in the face of pure madness would make her truly admirable. King though Duvall already looked vulnerable and beaten-down, and came across as a woman who had already suffered quite a bit in her life. This makes her reaction to everything less of a leap. As for Nicholson, King thought he already looked close to coming unhinged, and he had a fair point there: Nicholson certainly does always seem a hairsbreadth away from maniacal laughter. In King's eyes, Jack Torrance was an outwardly normal and loving father who is overcome by internal demons (and external ghosts). His transition to homicidal maniac was to be jarring and truly horrific. But with Nicholson in the role, it almost seems inevitable. The Shining is still an incredible film with Duvall and Nicholson in the roles, but I can't help but wonder how much more unsettling it would have been if Kubrick had followed King's casting advice.
One last thing I wanted to comment on is the question of the ghosts. On one level, it's easy to look at The Shining as a story about a Bad Place -- not just a Haunted House, but the sort of place that causes evil to happen, that drives its inhabitants mad. On this level, The Shining is full of malevolent ghosts that help to work its will, encouraging the darkest side of Jack Torrance and driving him to total madness. On a similar but different level, this is a story of a man who is simply ruined by his own internal demons and struggles. Jack Torrance was a troubled man before he came to the Outlook, prone to violence and alcoholism. The isolation and emptiness of the immense building only helped draw those inner demons to the surface. Jack goes crazy simply because he has nothing to distract him from the cruelty he's always carried in his heart; the worst case of writer's block in the universe drives him to pick up an axe and terrorize his family, unfairly labeling them as the source of his failures and frustrations.
King has said that he believes both levels equally influence the story's happenings -- yes, the Overlook is indeed haunted, and those malevolent spirits inside it worked alongside his internal conflict to drive Jack mad. Kubrick certainly included enough small moments (everything Wendy sees in her final run through the Hotel, for instance) to suggest that the ghosts were real, but he seems more firmly ensconced in the idea that Jack himself is the true cause of the story's horrors. In every scene where we see a ghost interacting with Jack and encouraging him to indulge his darker half, there are mirrors -- perhaps subtly suggesting that the mirrors are simply reflecting part of Jack back onto himself?
Whichever decision you come to by the end of the film, it doesn't really matter that much. Both takes on the story are terrifying, and it doesn't alter the hazy after-effects of nightmarish unreality the movie leaves you with. Ultimately, Kubrick crafted a truly surreal and amazing experience that largely (excepting a few rather large deviations) remained faithful to King's great story. It's a movie that will stick with you for days -- nay, years -- after you've seen it, and should be required viewing for everyone, horror fan or not. It's that good, and a classic for good reason. I may or may not be watching it again tonight, just to savor it, and have already started re-reading the book. If you haven't seen The Shining yet, please do yourself a favor and put it in your queue this Halloween. You shan't regret it, even if you find yourself plagued with nightmares afterwards....
FINAL SCORE: A just-about-as-perfect-as-you-can-get horror film that really makes you think and feel deserves a 10 out of 10.
Click to viewI THINK I'M IN LOVE WITH THIS TRAILER, TOO. IT'S JUST PERFECT. UGH.