“The Shining”: America Through a Glass Darkly
Kubrick, the Quintessential Auteur
Kubrick, Stanley. No other artist has ever shaken me so close to my core. The visceral understanding of universal truths that are revealed through his work cut very close to the bone.
It is difficult to think of Kubrick’s work without curiously contemplating the man himself. He is one with his art.
*Just look at him with that old camera. It’s just an extension of his magnificent, mad brain.
Image by [Instituto Maria Auxiliadora Neuquen/Flickr]
License: [https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/legalcode]
If you’ve never subjected yourself to a Stanley Kubrick film, be warned, his camera is his weapon. He uses it to plant tiny thought bombs between synapses in your brain, and when you least expect it, they will explode and chill you to your core.
One summer eve, I fell into a deep sleep after binge watching Kubrick films. Namely The Shining, 2001 A Space Odyssey, and Eyes Wide Shut. I awoke suddenly in the pitch of night with a crazy feeling in the pit of my stomach, and a swimming head. My brain had culminated and fermented Kubrick’s visual ideas while I slept, leaving me with a distinct feeling of white guilt, and an understanding of an underlying evil presence in mankind’s nature. No one has ever so completely demonstrated something to me, in such an ambiguous manner.
Image: “St Mary Lake” by Ken Thomas – KenThomas.us
Licensed under Public Domain via Commons –https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:St_Mary_Lake.jpg
Once Upon a Time…
The opening images are stunningly beautiful, and so essential to the overall feel of the movie. We are viewing the immense distance the Torrance family must travel to reach their isolated retreat. But the music! A very deep and ominous trumpet, accompanied by a disembodied and elongated moan-scream forecast something purely awful. Horrifying intrigue! I get excited just thinking about it. What’s wrong with me?
Image by [Felipe Pizarro/Flickr]
License [https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/2.0/]
As you can see from the still above, of poor, sweet little Danny Torrance (Dan Lloyd), lighting and colour are stark characteristics of this film. A deathly blueish hue is cast over the pale faces of the characters, emphasizing their whiteness. The whole film is almost overexposed. Complementing the paleness of the blues are Native American patterns of deep oranges, earthy browns, and of course, blood reds.
Draw from this what you will, but the Native American symbolism is pretty obvious in the film. A bleak look at America and its not so buried past.
*Spoiler Alert!
Image by [Todd Barnard/Flickr]
License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/legalcode
All Work and No Play Make Jack Nicholson an Amazing Actor
Nicholson does such a great job of portraying a loaded canon. This guy is about to explode at any moment. Dear old dad is on the wagon with a maddening writer’s block to boot. Look out.
Mr. Jack Torrance manifests that craaazy twinkle in his eye from the very beginning of the film. I love the scene when they’re all in the family car driving to the Overlook Hotel for their long winter residence there. Wendy (Shelley Duvall), inquires as to whether the Donner Party mishap had occurred in the area. When Danny asks his dad to explain what the Donner Party was, Jack delights in telling him that “they were a party of settlers in covered wagon times. They got snowbound one winter in the mountains, they had to resort to cannibalism in order to stay alive.” The look on Jack’s face, of utter delight while reflecting upon this horrific historical tidbit cracks me up every time. He has just a little too much fun with it.
*You won’t soon forget this bathroom…..
Image by [Andre Kitzmiller/Flickr]
License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/legalcode
Room 237
Being a huge fan of The Shining I was excited to see Rodney Ascher’s Room 237, a film that completely geeks out over the symbolic details and hidden meanings in the film. You have to be a freak to watch this, but it’s got some interesting insights (while grasping at more than a few straws methinks). But the very existence of Room 237, goes to show just how crazy Kubrick has made people in trying to dissect and understand his messages. It’s art in code.
The Shining, like all of Kubrick’s films, has struck and awed audiences for years. The film is 35 years old this year, and Room 237 was only released 3 years ago (2012). An instant and timeless classic.
Heather Austin is a freelance writer living in Nelson, BC. She studied English Literature and Film at Memorial University of Newfoundland. She enjoys skiing, canoeing, and thinking.
