Stanley Kubrick has often been hailed as one of the greatest filmmakers of all time. His visionary approach to the craft had reinvented practically every genre throughout the 1960’s and 70’s –  from science fiction with 2001: A Space Odyssey, to romance in Lolita, and even comedy via Dr.Strangelove. So it should come as no surprise that he also succeeded at reinvigorating the horror genre with his 1980 classic, The Shining. But for such a seemingly narrow genre, it is how he accomplished this feat that is truly interesting.

A New Kind of Monster Movie

Throughout the decades that preceded The Shining, horror films were primarily based around a protagonist having to fight for survival against a creature or a killer. From the early films like Dracula to the more modern ones such as Halloween, the horror genre had typically placed focus on the potential victim and their struggle. The Shining, however, instead placed the majority of the focus upon a protagonist’s descent into becoming the monster. Or rather, no longer being able to conceal that he is a monster. This shift in focus from the victim to a character study of the villain was so far ahead of its time (as the 1980’s were filled with “slasher horror”) that it wasn’t until over a decade later that the horror genre began to replicate this formula with movies such as Silence of the Lambs and Se7en. And though the plot does eventually result in a “victim flees from a stabby-murderer” climax, it is the psychological aspects involving the Jack Torrance character that make the movie so unique.

Haunted by Spirits

While the film places an obvious emphasis on the theme of isolation, The Shining is primarily a metaphor for alcoholism (or any chemical dependency), and how it reveals who we truly are. Stephen King is known for his issues with drugs and alcoholism, and essentially wrote Jack Torrance as a reflection of himself at the time, being a work-obsessed writer who’s dependence on alcohol made him violently angry without it. The hotel itself is a representation of Jack’s alcoholism, as he immediately feels “as though I had been here before” upon entering it, and quickly becomes addicted to this feeling of normalcy. Eventually he fully gives into this craving, as he proclaims, “I’d give my god damn soul for just a glass of beer” only to immediately become consumed by madness.

After this breaking point, Jack rapidly reveals himself as the violent, lustful and resentful human being he truly is. He begins to snap at his wife, Wendy, for even suggesting they leave the hotel (in essence depriving him of his addiction), immediately forgets about the injuries on his son, Danny, upon entering room 237 and seeing an attractive woman completely naked, and continually comments about how his wife is always holding him back and destroying his relationship with his son. And though it might initially appear as though Jack is simply being driven to madness by the hotel/his addiction, Grady’s line “You’ve always been the caretaker” is part of a pivotal scene that suggests Jack has always been this way.

The King is Not Amused

Interestingly, though the film garners heavy praise from critics and fans alike, Stephen King himself completely despises it. Rather than being a man whose evil is revealed through his alcoholism, King instead wrote Jack as a sympathetic character whose chemical dependency is what drives him mad. This creates an interesting contrast between King and Kubrick’s versions of Jack as a horror character. For King, the character’s descent into madness makes him much more sympathetic, but this also makes him less frightening. And more importantly, less unique. We’ve seen the tortured soul driven to lunacy before with films such as Psycho, wherein the psychotic character is much more relatable. But Kubrick’s version introduces a character that was unparalleled to horror films at that time – initially introduced as the protagonist we hope can escape their predicament, but who was actually the villain the entire time. Kubrick created a groundbreaking film that is almost perfect in its depiction of a madman giving in to his insanity (expertly ending with Jack shouting nonsense as a gibbering maniac). However…

One Scene From Perfection

There is one scene within The Shining that I believe prevents it from being a completely perfect film – the pantry scene.

Throughout the entire film, the bizarre and terrifying visions that the Torrance family encounters could be interpreted as hallucinations. Even esteemed critic Roger Ebert believed this to be a likely possibility, as he notes “When Jack thinks he is seeing other people, there is always a mirror present”. Danny is clearly psychic, but all of his visions may simply be warnings by his split personality “Tony”. And Wendy doesn’t begin to witness any of the supernatural occurrences until she is fleeing from her ax-wielding husband, suggesting she may just be experiencing a nervous breakdown. But for some reason, Stanley Kubrick decided to definitively reveal that the hotel is indeed haunted, as the ghosts must exist if they are able to let Jack out of the locked pantry. This scene completely destroys any possibility that all of the horrors the Torrance family are experiencing were simply in their minds the whole time. And for an already groundbreaking film, this open-interpretation would have really pushed The Shining even further ahead of its time.

But with that being said…you’d be hard-pressed to find a horror film that challenged the genre more than this one.