The Shining

Incredibly chilling. When you watch one of today’s would-be horrors, you can’t not be shocked at what’s happened. Fear doesn’t come from cheap surprises, but from the stifling atmosphere that pushes the hero over the brink of madness. Is it the filmmakers or the viewers who are to blame? The drive-bys on the tricycle and the visit to room no. 237 are terrifying in their very essence (loneliness, vulnerability) and not because a ghoul jumps out at you. Nicholson is great, a little weird right from the beginning, but still sufficiently natural. The wife in her simplicity is “normal" most of the time, but visually looks very strange, to say the least. Unlike in the book, Danny is demoted from the main role to child medium full of fear, but paradoxically it didn’t bother me much. It works perfectly in Kubrick’s hands. The blood in the elevator is super, the finale in the maze excellently executed. Maybe better than with the boiler. (10/05/2016)

The excellent minimalist soundtrack couldn't be better, and some scenes, especially the bathroom scene and the boy's vision of dismembered children in the hotel corridor, are truly horrifying, but I still have some reservations. Jack Nicholson, as excellent as he is, overacts disgustingly in some scenes; if that's the director's intention, I didn't quite get it. And Shelley Duvall, as she runs around the hotel with a knife in her hand, tries to play scared, but you can see in her face that she's not very good at it. But these are just tiny blemishes on the beauty of the whole. (11/11/2003)

Redrum. Redrum. Redrum. The main asset of this movie is neither Nicholson, nor Kubrick’s precise directing, but the flawless atmosphere in the mountain top hotel. Kubrick’s loose adaptation of King’s novel is attractive due to it being actually only very loosely based on the motifs in one of King’s best stories and is not a mere idealess “one to one" adaptation (however much I may think that Torrance’s fall was far too sudden in comparison with the gradual descent in the book). redruM! (30/01/2007)

Typical Stanley Kubrick. There is not a single moment in this film that is not part of the elaborate mosaic of a psychological labyrinth. Everything is perfectly timed and fluid, with the camera moving most of the time at right angles and in parallel with the walls of the stereotypical hotel. There isn’t a single note in the music that isn't necessary. It’s creative and musical minimalism of the coarsest grain, perfectly enhancing the oppressive feeling of the empty setting in which the story takes place. We don’t just watch Jack Nicholson as a movie character, but we become him thanks to Kubrick’s visually naturalistic directorial approach. As in Nicholson’s character, nervousness builds up within us until we fear what we would be capable of if we were in his shoes. It’s almost impossible to give The Shining the “horror” label, which belongs to ordinary horror movies for genre entertainment. And though it’s a shame that its coldness and precise calculation don’t allow me to experience the story of the main characters in any way different from what Kubrick intended, I’m giving The Shining a full five-star rating. I respect the depersonalised path that Kubrick took, because I'll find something new in this madness with every viewing. (05/06/2002)

I may be strange, but I tried to read King's book three times, and I always put it down about 100 pages. I didn't like it. But the film immediately got to me through its suggestive atmosphere of creeping terror, in which Jack Nicholson's masterful performance plays a big part. He plays Jack Torrance like a harp, first quietly with all the dark undertones, and then suddenly he starts to yank on all the strings. Jack's transformation into a monster is gradual, and he's basically "making" this film. Kubrick admirably managed to create fear without darkness and cramped spaces. The fear of The Shining is an airy, light, spacious fear... And that's absolutely unique. The film also feels authentic because the evil seems to have no source – is it "from inside" Jack, or is it evil embodied in the genius loci? Is Jack's madness really just the work of his bruised psyche? The viewer is stuck in the same uncertainty as the main heroes of the film - it is difficult to determine the distribution of forces between reality and the supernatural. But everything only leads to one thing... REDRUM... did it also give you goose bumps? (30/01/2004)