THE HOTEL CAUGHT DADDY
The Shining is Kubrick's last masterpiece. While
Full Metal Jacket and
Eyes Wide Shut have their moments, they just can't compare to Kubrick's most fertile period from 1964 to 1980.
After the commercial failure of
Barry Lyndon, Kubrick needed a hit, so he turned his attentions away from obscure works of 19th century literature towards the decidedly modern tradition of the late seventies best-seller. Moreover, Kubrick wondered why he never got to make a horror movie while touching other genres in the past such as war movies or science-fiction. As always, the question was that of story: Kubrick needed a good story to make a good film.
Enter Stephen King.
After toiling in obscurity for years, Stephen King finally hit the jackpot with his 1974 novel
Carrie and the equally successful
Salem's Lot the following year. Most importantly, King became a Hollywood commodity after Brian de Palma's adaptation of
Carrie with many of his novels and stories becoming up for grabs (soon, very soon, King's work will become a movie-making industry by itself). With his third novel,
The Shining, King's reputation as a major-league novelist was confirmed. Eventually a copy found its way round Kubrick's place in Hertfordshire and...bingo!
THE LOWDOWN: Alcoholic, abusive writer. Psychic kid. Mousy long-suffering wife. Haunted hotel. Snow (as in Lot's Of). Creepy twins. Creepy bartender. Creepy headwaiter (Oh, Hell! Creepy everything).
WHAT'S UP WITH THAT?: Others have come out with several interpretations about this movie. Bill Blakemore, for instance, sees it as a metaphor of the massacre of Native Americans by European settlers. Geoffrey Cocks expanded on that to include references to the Holocaust. Thomas Allen Nelson, on the other hand, focuses on the Torrances themselves, seeing it as a metaphor for the failures of the American family vs. the "successes" of American imperialism. Co-scriptwriter Diane Johnson also sees the movie as the story of a man who gradually comes to hate his family, to the point of murder.
Room 237 is a fantastic documentary about
The Shining giving free reign to Blakemore's and Cocks' theories, as well as others. It's a definite must see for any fans of the film.
For the purpose of this bit, I agree with Nelson and Johnson that the family dynamics of the Torrances are at the heart of the movie's narrative. Indeed, it is at the heart of the Overlook's efforts to corrupt Jack so he can deal with it "in the harshest possible way". There is a twist, however. The Overlook spooks wants Jack to kill his family (actually, it's Danny they want, but since Jack can't stand his wife either, she's obviously part of the deal). However, unbeknownst to all, Danny has subconsciously hatched a plot to kill his father using the nightmares of the Overlook. So, basically, the real victim of
The Shining is not Danny, but Jack who becomes trapped between a son who wishes him dead and ghosts who wants to use him against his own family. Therefore, the film can be read as a game of chess between Danny and the Overlook, with Jack as the main pawn, and Wendy as the Queen (whose main task is to protect the King, i.e. Danny).
A very interesting premise, yet what clues Kubrick provides us to back it up?
But first, let's ask ourselves a very important question: how good is Danny at shining?
Pretty good, I should say. Danny is able to send a telepathic signal to Hallorann from Colorado to Florida, a distance of almost 2 000 miles. Not only that, but when Danny "connects" with the Overlook chef he is, in fact, relaying to him what happens to Jack in room 237. So, first, Danny has tune in on Jack, and then "reports" what he sees to Hallorann. Not only that, but Danny is able to relay everything that happens to Jack in that room (basically we are watching Hallorann "seeing" what Danny transmits him). Pretty neat trick for a six years old kid. In King's novel, Danny sends a telepathic signal to Hallorann while the two of them are sitting in the chef's car, almost blowing Hallorann's mind out in the process. The hotel cook even acknowledges that Danny is the strongest "shiner" he has ever met.
What's interesting, here, is that Danny do not relay to Hallorann
his own experience in room 237 (as he was warned to not go in, maybe Danny didn't want Hallorann to be angry with him for ignoring his warning. He is only a kid after all).
In the Torrances' Boulder apartment, as Jack is in the middle of his interview, Wendy asks Danny if he's looking forward to living at the Overlook. Danny answers a non-committal "I guess so" but Tony (Danny's psychic double) answers that he "ain't". Later, as Danny is brushing his teeth, he presses on Tony for more. Not only does Tony confirm that Jack has got the job (he phones Wendy to tell her seconds later) but he also confirms that the Overlook is not a safe place to go. Danny's plan to kill his father is wholly unconscious, hatched mostly by Tony who sees Jack as the threat he is. In an interview with Michel Ciment, Kubrick states that if Danny's psychic abilities were perfect he could warn everyone about everything and if so there would be no movie. Kubrick is obviously ignoring the premise of his own movie. Danny does not warn anyone because:
1. Danny's too young to cope with such powers, so his subconscious has created Tony, a projection of his inner mind (in the novel, Tony is actually a projection of his older self. Note that Danny's full name is Daniel
Anthony Torrance).
2. Tony has to keep Danny's "cover" as an innocent child trapped by forces he cannot understand or cope with. For that purpose, Tony employs Danny has a sleeper agent. Danny tells Hallorann that it's not
himself who knows things, but Tony. Tony then tells Danny, who "can't remember everything". Moreover, while Jack and Wendy knows about Tony, Danny is under strict instructions never to reveal his visions.
3. Because, for Tony's plan to work, the Torrances
have to go to the Overlook and confront its many mysteries.
4. Finally, Nelson argues that Kubrick oftentimes poke fun at horror movie conventions. Therefore, if Danny told everyone about what's going to happen, no one would believe him and the family would proceed to the Overlook just the same.
Tony understands perfectly that the Overlook hotel is a bad place. He knew it all along. How much does he understand about Jack so the failed teacher/writer/husband will fall prey to the evil forces therein? Hard to say. However, the many ghosts haunting the hallways of the Overlook indicates that not many can resist its psychic assault. Jack's many failings in life makes him the perfect patsy for the Overlook, but
also the perfect victim. Wendy is far more resilient than even
she realizes, when shit gets real up there, Wendy focuses her attentions on Danny, so she enters Mama Bear mode. (Kubrick has argued that his Wendy his weaker than King's. That's certainly true, yet both of them manages to defend their son perfectly well in the end).
I mean, just look at Danny throughout all of this. For most of the film, he is preternaturally cool, calm and collected about everything. Sure, he gets scared every once in a while, yet he relies on Hallorann's and Tony's counsel to keep cool, as he knows the spirits cannot possibly harm him. Furthermore, when things get too hairy, Danny retreats deep within himself while Tony takes control, under Wendy's physical protection. Later, when all hell breaks loose and Jack is ready to fulfill his destiny (as both proxy and victim), Danny keeps his head together and manages to escape his father's murderous onslaught. At that point, Danny also fulfills the desires of another (i.e. Tony's) and purposefully leads Jack into the hedge maze (a place he has visited before, but not Jack). In a way, Danny was never in any real danger. The Overlook spooks cannot harm him (or anyone else for that matter), while he relies on Tony and Wendy to negotiate tight corners until Hallorann arrives.
That's why Kubrick changed the focus of the story from Danny to Jack. Jack is the only one in danger at the Overlook. Danny's got his shit together and Wendy, as a non-psychic is oblivious to everything until the very last moment at which point the Overlook is attempting to scare her even more (a fruitless task, akin to spilling a glass of water into the Atlantic ocean).
End of part one
