This week marks the 45th anniversary of “The Shining,” Stephen King’s second film, an adaptation of his bestselling novel that continues to captivate audiences and secure its place as one of his best book-to-movie adaptations. 

When the book came out in 1977, it was an immediate hit, becoming King’s first hardcover bestseller. Then, just three years later, the movie adaptation, directed by Stanley Kubrick, was released in theaters. 

When “The Shining” came out, it wasn’t considered a hit at the box office. Since then, however, the film has been re-released multiple times, bringing its total at the box office to about $47.9M, almost three times as much as the movie’s original budget. 

The film follows Jack Torrance, played by Jack Nicholson, who brings along his wife Wendy, played by Shelley Duvall, and five-year-old son Danny, played by Danny Lloyd, as he becomes the winter caretaker for the Overlook Hotel in Colorado. 

Danny ​​has psychic powers and, upon arriving at the Overlook hotel, meets the head chef, David Hallorann, played by Scatman Crothers, who also has these supernatural abilities. David explains to Danny that his grandmother also had these  powers, only she called them “shining.” 

David warns Danny that sinister things are going on in the hotel that only people who “shine” can see.  

The longer the family is alone at the hotel, the further Jack descends into madness. He’s constantly irritable, he isn’t sleeping, and the book he has been working on is full of pages and pages of the same sentence, “All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.”

Although the film has high scores on Rotten Tomatoes, IMDB and even Letterboxd, King is not a fan of Kubrick’s adaptation. King mainly didn’t like how Nicholson played his character. In the book, Jack slowly becomes more and more insane; in the film, King felt Nicholson’s performance made it feel like Jack was crazy from the start. Overall, King believed the film was cold and lacked emotional depth. 

The horror in Kubrick’s adaptation is a father slowly descending into madness as his mental health deteriorates. While, in his book, King sees the horror as supernatural forces threatening the family. 

King did eventually revisit the Torrance family, publishing a sequel in 2013 titled “Doctor Sleep.” The sequel focuses on an adult Danny as he has learned to control his “shining,” but his past at the hotel still haunts him. 

In 2019, “Doctor Sleep” got its own film adaptation, directed by Mike Flanagan, that King believed redeemed Kubrick’s film. 

But Kubrick’s “The Shining” was always good. While no, you don’t get the sense that the Torrance family is a warm and happy family, you get the sense that they all care for each other, at least in the beginning. This makes it all the more shocking to see Jack spiral and develop homicidal tendencies.

Despite King’s complaints, there are definite supernatural elements present within the movie. While maybe not the main reason the movie is so scary, anything that has to do with room 217 is not something I would ever want to encounter, especially alone. 

“The Shining” has been regarded as a classic, influential horror film that some would even call the best, pioneering the psychological horror subgenre. If you haven’t seen it, I definitely recommend you give it a watch. Even after 45 years, it still holds up. 

Categories: Arts & Entertainment