I first saw The Shining on VHS when I was an undergraduate, over 10 years ago now. So even though I had seen it before I had forgotten a lot of the details and more importantly forgotten just how much of an amazing film The Shining is.
Though it certainly needs no introduction, I'll outline the plot here for completeness. Jack and Wendy Torrance (Jack Nicholson and Shelley Duvall) have recently moved to Boulder in Colorado after Jack lost his teaching job in Wyoming. Jack takes a job house-sitting the Overlook hotel for the winter, which gets snowed in and becomes unreachable without a specialist snow vehicle. He, Wendy and their young son Danny move there and settle in for 5 months of seclusion, peace and quiet so that Jack can write his book. Before taking the job though, Jack is told that a decade ago a previous caretaker slaughtered his entire family at the hotel and that the seclusion can do strange things to people. At the same time, Danny is having fits and his imaginary friend appears to know things Danny couldn't possibly have knowledge of. It's the set up for a brilliantly-paced ghost story / thriller / horror, one which has entered many a 'top films' list over the years.
There's so much more in The Shining than first meets the eye. There are hints at occult practices and ritual sacrifices from the soundtrack and the visions of horrors at the hotel. Kubrick dangles a variety of possibilities in front of the viewer who is prepared to think about what they're witnessing. There is the possibility that either the hotel manager, Jack, or both knew what was likely to happen at the hotel when he took the job - which then opens up questions as to why he would take the job at all. The final few shots of the film ask further questions about what the hotel does to people; and the question of if what happens there has an otherworldly aspect or is simply the product of human insanity is left open. Then there's the direction. Kubrick effortlessly sets up the space of the hotel without resorting to bland exposition and uses simple techniques to generate a suspense in everything that happens.
Every aspect of the film is outstanding, from the camerawork and attention to detail through to the casting and astonishingly unhinged performances from both Jack Nicholson and Shelley Duvall. Nicholson conveys an impression of a potential madman teetering on the edge even in the opening scene. At no point does he need to gurn at the camera or scream insanities, just the way he responds to questions with an overly-enforced calm tells us much of what we need to know about a character actively engaged in repressing rage. Duvall plays Wendy as a woman living a life she's desperately trying to pretend is normal. Trapped between Jack's violent potential and Danny's unknown abilities, she's slowly going mad in her own way. The straight horror elements of the film are used sparingly (we see only one death in the whole film) and therefore effectively. When we see inside Danny's visions of twin girls slaughtered and rivers of blood crashing down a lift shaft they are fleeting glimpses punctuating the image of the face of a terrified young boy - rather than a special effect to be leered over. Proving once again that in the horror genre, less is more.
In conclusion then, it's hardly news that The Shining is brilliant. But it's such a long time since I had seen it I had completely forgotten what an outstanding example of film-making it is. If anyone reading this blog hasn't seen it then you've been making a big mistake all your life. It's currently being shown in its extended US version at the BFI in London - go and watch it!
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