31 October 2012

winter of our discontent.

47. The Shining (1980)

Apparently Stephen King didn't like Stanley Kubrick's adaptation of his dumb little novel. Well, boo-hoo. Were you upset that the movie didn't have topiary animals that come to life like your book did, Stevie? I guess maybe you should think twice before you cash in and option out your books. But—in case nobody told you—this is Stanley fucking Kubrick here. Yeah, I know you're used to having legendary top-tier directors like Fritz Kiersch, Fraser C. Heston, Lewis Teague, and Brett Leonard adapt your books for the screen, but I'm afraid sometimes you just have to suck it up and let hacks like Kubrick and De Palma have a go at your literary masterworks. True, they really can't hope to match the genius you displayed when you directed Maximum Overdrive, but once in awhile I think it's nice to throw a less competent director a few scraps from your table, you know?


Stephen King, you're an idiot. Kubrick's The Shining may or may not be a faithful adaptation of the novel you wrote—I don't really know because I haven't read it—but you have to admit the film is brilliant on its own terms. Even if it's not your book, it's a great film—and I'm willing to bet that Kubrick fixed at least a few problems in the original text. (See the reference to the topiary animals above.) 

Now on with the show... I'm not a Jack Nicholson fan in general. He kind of bugs me. You see, I'm really tired of the smarmy characters he plays in almost all of his films—and I suspect that they are mostly subtle variations of his own personality. He's one of those actors who's been treading water for so long that now he's arrived at a place in his career where he's almost a self-parody. Nevertheless, I can't imagine a better or more fitting actor to play the character of Jack Torrance in The Shining. Nicholson is able—with the arch of an eyebrow, a long meaningful glare, or just the tone of his voice—to convey such an overwhelming sense of menace that I can't imagine any actor equaling him here. This was, in other words, a role he was born to play.


When I think of Stanley Kubrick, I think of precision. In most of his films, every detail seems so precise, so thoroughly considered and calculated, that it borders on OCD. I really don't know much about the man or his way of working, so maybe this is a false impression, but everything in The Shining—the sets, the furniture, the camera movement, the sound, the music, the composition—feels as though it is part of an indivisible, unified whole. That's unusual in filmmaking, I think. There are a few other directors who sometimes give me the same impression—Ingmar Bergman and Orson Welles, for example—but never quite to the degree that Kubrick does. 

23 comments:

  1. Shelley Duvall's pretty awesome in this, too. Did I ever tell you the horrible story of seeing The Shining being aired on the telly and so I planned my whole evening around it only to find out that it was the installment version with the fucking dude from Wings? Yeah, I was not happy.

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    1. I watched a short documentary of the making of The Shining that was on the Blu-Ray. Some of the behind-the-scenes people said Kubrick was 'very mean' to Duvall to get that performance out of her.

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    2. I don't care what anybody (i.e. Esteban) says; Shelly Duvall was kinda hot in this film.

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    3. Jesus God but you're a disgusting fuck, Brian. Yuck. She deserved to get killed. I think the only problem with that movie is that her husband didn't try to kill her on the first day.

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    4. I agree with Esteban here. (To some extent.) It takes a... unique man to find Shelley Duvall hot.

      And, yes, 'unique' is a euphemism.

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    5. Good- more of that hot 1980 Shelly Duvall action for me... er, in the parallel universe where I'm not 11 years old in 1980, and where I actually meet Shelly Duvall, etc.

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  2. Also, you seem very anti–Stephen King here. Are you? I read this book in high school and I thought it was pretty good. Not as good as The Stand, though. Not sure if an adult reading of this would hold up, but there it is.

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    1. I am not very anti-Stephen King, but I think his critiques of and visions for film adaptations of his books are generally pretty inept. I don't think he has the eye or ear of a filmmaker, in other words.

      I've only read three of his books—Carrie, Pet Sematary, and Thinner—and they were all good escapist entertainment, but I don't think King is a great writer (based on what I've read).

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    2. I totally agree with this. I do enjoy a King read every now and then, but no, he is absolutely not a great writer at all.

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    3. The novel for The Shining sucks. Period.

      King, from my understanding, mostly disliked that Kubrick had the Torrance character be so completely given over to evil. In the novel, he ends up saving the day after terrorizing his family -- but not before he says a few heartfelt, paternal words to his boy.

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    4. A feel-good ending? Ugh.

      This is why King should stick to mass-market paperbacks and leave movies to the experts.

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  3. (P.S. I still hold that the role Jack Nicholson was born to play was the 'mental patient' in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. Although in fairness, I suppose one could be born for multiple roles.)

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    1. I think you know I'm not at all a fan of Cuckoo's Nest, so we'll agree to disagree on that one.

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    2. Actually I didn't know that! Or at least if I did, I've since forgotten. Do you like Milos Forman? Amadeus would easily make my list of Top 10 movies of all-time ever and ever amen.

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    3. I have to confess that I saw Amadeus so long ago that I couldn't tell you how I feel really feel about it.

      No, I wouldn't call myself a fan of Milos Forman, but I think his two of his early Czech language films Fireman's Ball and Loves of a Blonde are very good.

      I disliked Ragtime. I remember that. But I didn't like the book either.

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  4. Nice review, David.

    Kubrick's obsession with detail was one of the themes at the LACMA exhibit. Every prop had to be run by him, and he was a stickler for research. In fact, he had an unrealized (unfortunately) project on Napoleon that I saw some of his notes for. Not to oversell it, but it was pretty astonishing. Taschen even has a book out about it: http://www.taschen.com/pages/en/catalogue/film/all/04973/facts.stanley_kubricks_napoleon_the_greatest_movie_never_made.htm

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    1. Wow. That didn't come out very well...

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    2. I own that Taschen Napoleon book! Brian got it for me—for my last birthday, I think it was. It makes me angry that the film was never made. (The Shining making-of documentary said he was going to have Nicholson play Napoleon. That would have been interesting.)

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    3. Nicholson as Napoleon? That seems...weird.

      I'm disappointed that the movie was never made, too.

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  6. The Shining was voted the "best horror movie of all time" by the masses on IMDb (which probably delegitimizes it for David):

    http://marquee.blogs.cnn.com/2012/10/31/imdb-users-pick-top-10-horror-movies-of-all-time/?hpt=hp_t3

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    1. Cloverfield, Saw, and Zombieland are also on that list. Apparently only fifteen-year-olds responded to the poll.

      Actually, the fact that the masses love The Shining doesn't delegitimize it for me.

      But the fact that you do does.

      ZING! POW! KABLAMMY!

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