The Shining (1980)

I've read King's original novel, and I've seen Kubrick's film several times...but it's been awhile since I've done either. Last week I went back and re-read King's original tale, and fell in love with it all over again. Just a creepy, wonderful story. This past weekend I re-watched Kubrick's film, and I can understand why King doesn't really care for it. Let me state right up front, that I really enjoy this movie. It's a beautifully shot film; amazing camerwork, a hauntingly unforgettable score, and some fantastic performances. I think the biggest problem with this movie, is also it's biggest asset, and that's Jack Nicholson. The character of Jack Torrance in the novel strives to be a loving father, he's truly struggling with his sobriety, and you see that he's really hoping that the caretaker's job will give he and his family the second chance that they desperately need. In the novel Jack Torrance loves Wendy, and he's doing everything he can to save his marriage. Jack Nicholson's Jack Torrance seems to hate his wife from the get-go. On the way to The Overlook hotel, he's already lost his patience with both Wendy and Danny, you get the feeling that this Jack Torrance hates being a family man. You don't feel that Torrance regrets hurting Danny, and you just know that, Overlook or not, this Jack Torrance would be hitting the bottle again. There really isn't much of a character arc for the movie version of Jack Torrance as he slides from irritation to outright lunacy almost as soon as the first snowflakes fall. What really stood out to me on this viewing was what a wonderful performance Shelley Duvall put in as Wendy. As the movie opens you see that she's battled for her family, she is hanging onto threads to try and keep her family together, and once they are in the Overlook, and Jack starts his lunacy, her performance gets amped up. I think that Duvall's performance gets buried under everything Jack Nicholson is doing (and how could it not?), but the next time you watch this, pay to attention to Wendy. Her character arc his much more compelling, and I think Duvall adds so much to the film, and to the character of Wendy, as it's much better than what King gave to Wendy. Danny Lloyd as young Danny Torrance carries a lot of the film on his shoulders, and he is really, really good. If you've ever seen the unfortunate TV mini-series of "The Shining", you can see just how crucial the character of Danny is to the tale, and if the role is miscast, the story can't be salvaged. Lloyd carries his scenes, and plays off of Duvall and Scatman Crothers really well. His few scenes with Nicholson are secondary as Nicholson is kind of doing his own thing, and you kind of forget who or what else is in the room. The movie, and Nicholson's performance is iconic. If you grew up in the 70's and 80's, then "The Shining" stands with "Halloween", "Texas Chainsaw Massacre" and "Alien" as on of the building blocks of modern horror. Again, it's a beautiful film, and so well shot, you should watch it just to see see Kubrick at the top of his game. If you're only familiar with the film, then make sure you pick up King's novel. It parallels the film in some ways, but it's a drastically different take. With the novel, you get the feeling that the Overlook is haunted, where the film feels more a film a man's slide into insanity.

The movie The Shining was excellently produced, written, and directed, with exemplary actors. The producer, writer, and director, Stanley Kubrick, has a clear vision of what he wants the movie to be about, how it should look, and how it should feel. He then executes this near flawlessly, with only a few moments containing imperfection. The casted actors are great, with the mother portrayed as caring but weary of the hotel, and her husband, the father shown as seeming normal, though possibly a little bit off putting. Eventually he changes drastically, losing his mind. The child actor is in my opinion one of, if not the best casting choices, doing surprisingly well for portraying an extraordinary child who's hiding his gift, and he does extremely well during the more intense parts of the film, such as when he acts possessed. He changes his voice and seems unfocused. The technical aspects of film making are well executed too. The camera is only shaky during scenes where it helps empower the mood, or during air shots such as a birds-eye view of a car. The special effects are used sparsely, but well, such as blood, ice, and more. The musical score immensely affects the mood, and the sound rarely glitches or seems off, and the editing is sometimes a little choppy but on par for when the movie came out. The story is based around a father who accepts a job taking care of the Overlook Hotel in the Colorado mountains over the winter so he can write a novel. It closes due to roads not being passable, so they are isolated, and practically trapped. He has been told that one of the previous caretakers went mad and murdered his family, but this doesn’t faze him. He still brings his wife and young son to live with him. However, not everyone and everything are as they seem. The mother, named Wendy, played by Shelly Duval, does a great job of playing a convincing role. She expresses all fear and emotions as if what was happening was true. The father, Jack, played by Jack Nicholson, embraces the role, making it seem as if he is truly losing his mind. The child, Danny, played by Danny Lloyd, is an extraordinary child actor. He has an imaginary friend, Tony, who seems to voice the boy’s visions. There’s also another prominent character, the chef, Dick, played by Scatman Crowthers. He does a great job acting, and his character explains to Danny his gift that they share, which he calls shining. Shining is the ability to mentally see the past and future of places and communicate with others. He attempts to mentor Danny as much as he can. The story is paced slowly at first, but speeds up dramatically during the last 20 minutes or so. This pacing creates tension through dramatic irony and suspense, as you know something is going to happen, but nothing does for a while, or only small things that are out of the ordinary but nothing too horrifying. The writing of the movie, though terrific, isn’t too much of a feat, since the movie is based on a book by Stephen King of the same name. The writing interprets this book, so it is not original. However, this interpretation is great, making it Kubrick's own work. Overall, the movie is excellent horror, though it’s slow at first. The buildup allows eerie things to occur, showing a mental spiral of the father into insanity as more and more happens, then climaxing and all the suspense is released and replaced with action, furthering the horror. It’s a great movie but won’t be as enjoyable to those who prefer fast paced, thrilling horror compared to a slow, psychological horror.

Thankyou !!!!, Recieved 1-27-26. Just Love it !!!!, saw it quite awhile back " (Good movie) !!!!. Packaged very nicely, Speedy Shipping. Thankyiu, and Sincerely, Ron Martino-Meuret

Essential horror movie!! A timeless classic!

Brilliant. What more is there to say.

Certainly a movie worth it's praise for many years. An eerie movie that delivers in tense moments that slowly dip you further into fear with a great story to pull you along. Actors play their roles well, in particular Jack Nicholson gives his best performance yet. Unfortunately, I have some issue with Kubrick's films that seems apparent in many of his movies. The biggest issue is that he lets some scenes go on for far too long and it is no different here. At a run time of 2.5 hours there are more than a few scenes that should have at least been shortened. I understand the need for setup and letting things stew but this man is over boiling his product. It gets worse when the movie sort of suddenly ends where it could have really used a better send off. Maybe this is meant to confuse or leave some things to question but... it just wasn't very satisfying. We also get a handful of scenes that don't make much sense or are just straight weird and feel unnecessary. Issues with Kubrick's directing choices aside, the movie holds up very well and delivers a slow build eerie movie that very few get right today.

On of the greatest movies ever made

Best horror and suspense. My favorite of all time, cult classic

Great movie from one of the greatest directors ever. Few great extras. Picture and sound are very good, although not quite excellent. Some small nits to pick are that there is no Settings menu and that main feature starts automatically bypassing the main menu, which is common to most movies in this Kubrick collection (and annoying).

Wer kennt die Memes im Internet nicht, wo "Jack" seinen Kopf durch die Tür steckt, nachdem er diese im Bad mit der Axt zerstört hat? Hin und wieder kam der Film im Fernsehen aber ich habe ihn nie gesehen, was ich zu tiefst bereue, denn der Film ist ein echter Kracher. Unglaublich, was man hier bereits 1980 gezaubert hat. Ich kenne auch andere Filme von Kubrick wie z.B. 2001 Odyssee, welchen ich aber einfach nur furchtbar langweilig fand, da es kein richtiger Film sondern mehr ein Musical oder eine Art "Kunst" sein sollte. Bei Shining ist das aber ganz anders. Der Film ist nicht nur künstlerisch, sondern auch von Anfang bis Ende absolut spannend und schafft es mit dem mitreißenden bedrohenden Soundtrack vor den Fernseher zu fesseln. Die Charaktere passen hervorragend in den Film und besonders die Figur Jack verkörpert den "Psycho" perfekt. Gestik und Mimik sind einfach unübertroffen. Ich fand es unglaublich dass dieser Film von 1980 sein soll. Ja man merkt, dass es kein aktueller Film ist, aber er ist deshalb keinesfalls schlechter. Nach Odyssee waren meine Erwartungen sehr gering und ich wurde mächtig überrollt. Besonders mit der 4K Blu Ray war das Bild unfassbar gut. Den Ton musste man leider etwas lauter stellen für die Stimmen und zwischendrin waren dann die Soundtrack Geräusche etwas zu laut, aber das ist meckern auf hohem Niveau. Hier gibt es ja auch 23 Minuten mehr Inhalt mit der längeren US Fassung. Das wurde hier teilweise kritisiert, was ich nicht nachvollziehen kann. Ich fand keine einzige Szene im Film überflüssig sondern absolut passend und brauchbar. Wären die 23 Minuten weg gewesen, hätte mMn. etwas gefehlt! Ja es gab zwar zwischendrin in den Extraszenen manchmal einen kleinen Tonwechsel mit anderem Sprecher? Aber die Abweichung war kaum wahrzunehmen und kam auch nur wenige male vor. Den Filmfluss oder die Atmosphäre hat das nahezu gar nicht beeinträchtigt. Die Story ist wieder mal relativ komplex, aber trotzdem sehr gut zu verstehen, auch wenn man das Buch nicht gelesen hat. Mit einer Erklärung bei Google kann man natürlich nach dem Film noch den ein oder anderen Aha Effekt erhalten, aber im großen und ganzen hat man es wirklich gut verstanden und mir hat am Ende des Filmes nichts weiter gefehlt. Ich kann den Film absolut empfehlen, wer guten klassischen Horror mit guter Story sucht und auf unnötige Jump Scares verzichten kann.

"The Shining" is one of the best horror thrillers ever made, it is absolutely fantastic. In my opinion, it is significantly better than the TV mini series, being more scary and haunting. While the mini series is much more true to the book, The original Shining is much more better overall. The acting is great, Jack Nicholson receives an Oscar for portraying Jack Torrance - he is perfect for the part. If you want an actor to play a role about going mad and crazy, you can't go wrong with Nicholson. Danny Lloyd stars as Jack's son, Danny! He plays really well too, those eyes is why he was chose to play the part. He made it really effective when he stared for a really long time at something ghostly in the hotel. Wendy is played by Shelley Duvall, many people thought she was too weepy and soppy, but that was all for affect. Mister Halloran was also brilliant, as was all the cast, a perfect set-up in that respect. This film was directed by Stanley Kubrick back in 1990, and he did a great job, making a suspense-filled masterpiece. Plot: Jack Torrance (Jack Nicholson), his wife Wendy (Shelley Duvall) and young son Danny come to the vacant, isolated Overlook Hotel to get away from it all. Also, Jack is off-season caretaker and is working on his new writing project, the silence and vacantness of the Overlook seems a perfect place for him to focus on his work. However, not all is as it seems. Jack's son, Danny possesses a very unique gift, "The Shining", where he can see things other can't. Danny has a psychic gift that the hotels vile spirits desperately want. But that's only part of the trouble. Due to the isolation at the Overlook, there is another danger far closer, Danny's dad slowly starts to go insane... Stephen King did not like Stanley Kubrick's adaptation of his hit novel, one of the reasons for this judgement was due to Jack Nicholson playing "Jack" way too over the top. But it's Nicholson, obviously he's goanna play him over the top. Well in a way I can see where the mans coming from because Jack was crackers all the way through. He was nuts - just nuts. Jack Nicholson made the film good along with its dreamlike tracking shots, shock after shock of occurrence with vivid performances and menacing settings. There is certain feeling you get all the way through this film, a dread of deadly expectation, but don't confuse that with predictability. I bet all of you who have already seen this film always remember the scenes where Danny rode his kind of mini car around all of the Overlook's corridors, this was really effective, with the wheels of the car making a noise that makes you think of some kind of terror waiting to happen. Not to mention the masterful insertion of REDRUM, which really made you crap your pants before the "Here's Johnny!" scene. When Jack sticks his head through the gap in the axed door, he makes a face only he could and the way he acted in that scene just sums up what a great actor he really is - he did that from the heart. It was like staring into madness, but he was mad. He had lost it completely by the time this scene took hold. Many people did not understand why Jack said "here's Johnny!", instead of "Here's Jacky!" Well, I'll explain. Jack Torrance used to watch a popular show every night that millions watched on the TV, and the presenter was always introduced by the phrase "Here's Johnny", because the presenters name was Johnny Carson. When Jack Torrance says it, it just shows how insane he's gotten, with a psycho grin on his face to demonstrate how demented his mind was by that point. We did have a premonition early on in the film that Jack might go mad, when we were told by Mister Ullman, the manager of the hotel, that Delbert Grady took care of the hotel during the winter last time and killed his wife and children with an axe. He said that "long term isolation" must had made him suffer from a complete mental breakdown. This film does not fail with comes to pace consistency, keeping us hooked right the way through by throwing things in are face nearly every five minutes. The hallway scene was the first impression that something bad was happening, with one of the scariest moments in one of the Overlook's guest rooms - the bathtub scene. This was so well done and damn bloody frightening! There are so many reasons why this film is memorable, with the climax making it all the more brilliant will a full-on, crazy resolution. This was very ambitiously done, and paid off really well. The setting is perfect for the nature of the film. The snow scenes were beautifully shot, with great scenery. The music in this film is really good, making each scene eerie and with shivers going up the spine. It suits the theme of the film perfectly, Kubrick really knew what he was doing with this. The question throughout the film is whether Jack is imagining the spirits and ghosts that thrive in the hotel, or if there is actually a terror really going on. The supernatural side of this film ties in perfectly with this question and makes you think how and where this terror originated from. The TV mini series is good as well, don't get me wrong. But the actor who plays jack isn't a cut over Nicholson portrayal. The main factor for me, is that it is not scary. This film is a classic for that reason and for it being the first epic horror film that stood out from the crowd. The cast is good though in the mini series, namely Wendy who is played by one of Tom Cruise's ex girlfriends, Rebecca De Mornay who did an excellent job, as did the boy who played the part of Danny. The actor was played Jack was great too, but when you compare him to "here's Johnny!", it's no wonder he's put in the shade. I also found that the mini series tended to drag on in parts, it was much longer and had more time for development of characters and background history - Jack's alcoholism. As well as, in this one we saw Jack Torrance slowly transform from normal person to mad psychopath, it was gradual, good to see how he changed. In this version, Kubrick got straight to the point. Jack was mad right the way through really, he was a proper odd-ball, with his weirdo faces which was supposedly his "normal state", but his psycho state was the same but worse. This version is better, but both are good in their own right. Now, with this Blu-ray release you can see the film in the best format ever - high definition, a classic film that deserves classic representation. With the exception of Misery, "The Shining" is perhaps the best adaptation of King's books ever. IT and CARRIE are also good, but this is better. Never again in the history of film will there be a harrowing, mind-blowing masterpiece as good as this. It's enthralling, think of the greatest terror imaginable. Would you think of fear of murder by someone who is supposed to love and protect you? Perhaps, because this could really happen - making it all the more fantastic. It's realistic, not in the sense of being taken to the extremes that this film was, I mean no ones madder that Jack Nicholson, but someone could really go insane. Sometimes the terror is far closer to home. Once you have watched this film, you will never forget it, ever. It is stunning, one of the best horror thrillers ever. See it, you'll be glad you did.

La película tiene muy buena calidad de imagen y para el que tenga dudas la película tiene idioma castellano. No es una versión extendida pero por 6 eu está genial , gran peliculón

En remplacement de la version dvd dans ma collection.