"What's basically wrong with Kubrick's version of The
Shining is that it's a film by a man who thinks too much and feels too little;
and that's why, for all its virtuoso effects, it never gets you by the throat
and hangs on the way real horror should." – Stephen King
Stephen King has been very outspoken on his dissatisfaction
with Stanley Kubrick's adaptation of The Shining, but over the past three
decades, few cinephiles have shared his view on the flaws in Kubrick's approach.
In 1997, King even attempted to rectify those perceived wrongs by writing a TV
miniseries that stuck rigidly to the content of his novel, but while that
effort was quickly forgotten, the 1980 film has endured. When people hear the
name The Shining now, they immediately think of Jack Nicholson losing his mind,
Shelley Duvall whimpering with fear, Danny Lloyd cycling endlessly around those
long corridors, and the elevators opening to release a torrent of blood. Despite
King's protestations, it's Stanley Kubrick's The Shining that refuses to let
go.
In some respects, perhaps King was right in his assessment
of Kubrick. The director didn't come close to making a horror film in the form
that we have come to expect of such a picture. He didn't try to make the
audience jump with cheap scare tactics. Instead, Kubrick's film is quieter, slower
and more enigmatic, but this is how it slowly sucks us into its brilliantly constructed environment and
gets under our skin in a deeper way than the average genre picture. It is a ghost
story, but it's also a portrait of a man going mad and a family falling apart,
and the film is so evidently the work of a master filmmaker, it hypnotises even if
you struggle to grasp what exactly the film is about.
That vexing question of The Shining's meaning is one that
has prompted debate ever since its initial release, and in the recent
documentary Room 237, a group of theorists put forward their own ideas about
Kubrick's intentions. As far-fetched as these suggestions may often be,
however, The Shining is a film that can seemingly support any reading ; it is so richly ambiguous
and teasingly symbolic. The basic narrative of the film is simple enough.
Aspiring writer Jack Torrance (Nicholson) takes the role of winter caretaker in
the Overlook Hotel, where hopes to find the peace and isolation required to
complete his novel. His wife Wendy (Duvall) joins him with their son Danny
(Lloyd), and Danny brings his imaginary friend Tony, whom he speaks to while
his parents indulge this childish fantasy. But the kindly chef Dick Halloran
(Scatman Crothers) sees something more in Danny; a kindred spirit, another who
possess that extra-sensory perception that his grandmother called "the
shining".
As Jack starts to go crazy – "All work and no play
makes Jack a dull boy" – and his wife cowers in fear, Kubrick draws two
extraordinary performances from Nicholson and Duvall. The making-of documentary
filmed on set by the director's daughter shows how he worked with his two stars,
indulging Nicholson while pushing Duvall ever closer to her emotional breaking
point. When the film reaches its apex with an axe-wielding Jack chasing his
wife around the hotel, both the husband's insanity and the wife's quivering
fear feel entirely real. From Danny Lloyd too, Kubrick coaxes one of the great
screen child performances, as the young actor displays a stillness that is so
unsettling in one so young. Kubrick was often accused of being a cold
formalist, disinterested in the human factor of his films, but amid the fastidiously
controlled mise-en-scène, he churns up a tumultuous emotional undertow that
keeps it from feeling like too much of a deliberate exercise in craft.
When The Shining was released in 1980 it received mixed
reviews from American critics and many complaints centred on the film's length
and pacing. In response, Kubrick re-edited the film for its European release,
shaving off over twenty minutes and endorsing the shorter cut as his official
version. The release of the longer American version of The Shining in the UK is
something of a mixed blessing. Some scenes appear entirely superfluous – such as
a couple ineffectually extending Halloran's journey to the snowbound hotel – while others
feel weirdly out of place, notably a startlingly odd shot of skeletons that
occurs late in the film. But there are more glimpses of the director's brilliance
here too, the slower pace often feels more chillingly exact, and there are
valuable new scenes with Wendy and Danny. Either way, an opportunity to see
The Shining, in any form, on the big screen is one not to be passed up. It
remains a milestone, not just of horror but of cinema; a film that completely
envelops us in its world and defies any rational explanation. Seeing The
Shining in a cinema allows us to scan the screen for clues, appreciate the insidious
sound design, marvel at Kubrick's compositional acuity and – above all – to lose
ourselves in this endlessly fascinating maze.