# Kubrick's "The Shining" **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [April 17, 2005, 7:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kubricks-the-shining/299743 "2005-04-17T07:56:26Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2005, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kubricks-the-shining/299743/61 "2005-04-19T17:26:16Z")
> [@Avumede](#): > > The Shining is the best horror movie out there. What other movie can come close? I understand that not everyone likes Kubrick’s slow-moving style, though. But for those of us who not only love it, but prefer it to something more fast-paced, the Shining is jaw-droppingly suspensful and quite scary. You’ll have to trust me on this one… > > …You totally missed the point of this sequence. It drove you crazy. That’s the point of it! It is very classic and effective technique to draw out suspense by putting in something totally mundane and boring when the audience is waiting for the climax. David Lynch does this too, to great effect. Boy, there is nothing I hate more than people who jump into movie threads and present an opinion that differs from other opinions by saying that anyone who doesn’t agree with them doesn’t UNDERSTAND the movie, which is code for “I am smarter than you.” You’ve also managed to combine it with the “And I don’t need my movies to be like MTV, unlike you” condescension. This may come as a stunner, but I actually DO understand a little bit about movies, and I do understand the concept of suspense and using mundane actions to draw suspense out. No, the sequence did not drive me crazy with SUSPENSE, it filled me with boredom. Yes, I know Kubrick might have been trying to build suspense; I also know, from long experience, that the editing and pacing of his films is not always very good. MY guess is that he was trying to build suspense and ended up just boring the hell out of a lot of people with a sequence that could have been much better edited, better directed, and better acted. Believe it or not, that does not make me, or anyone else who doesn’t “trust” you that this is the best horror movie ever, stupid or guilty of a failure to “understand” anything. ---
**Author:** ![NutMagnet](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ea5d25/32.png) [@NutMagnet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NutMagnet)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2005, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kubricks-the-shining/299743/62 "2005-04-19T17:33:14Z")
**WhyNot** That article reminds me of the full page NY TImes article about The Penguin in _Batman_. They claimed the movie was anti-semitic because the Penguin was a stereotype of a Jew, and ate herring and a whole bunch of other crap. It too was serious, but was too goofy for words. ---
**Author:** ![AHunter3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ahunter3/32/368_2.png) [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2005, 7:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kubricks-the-shining/299743/63 "2005-04-19T19:39:23Z")
The version that King himself put out a few years back was overlong and ponderously mispaced to the point that I kept wanting to shout “Get on with it, already!”. It’s still a much better movie in nearly every respect than Kubrick’s. Maybe I just don’t like Kubrick. _Clockwork Orange_ did nothing for me either. Meanwhile, though, _The Shining_ is the best thing King ever wrote, and it deserved far better. ---
**Author:** ![Cartooniverse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cartooniverse/32/3084_2.png) [@Cartooniverse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cartooniverse)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2005, 3:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kubricks-the-shining/299743/64 "2005-04-21T15:06:16Z")
> [@pepperlandgirl](#): > > In the book, Jack broke _Danny’s_ arm when he was a toddler because Danny messed up his manuscript. I think he just punched the student in the parking lot. You are both correct. I’m sorry. Odd, how I combined those two events in my memory. Well, at least the point I was making is still valid. As a pure regular human being, he was an angry violent man. Forget any higher power or spiritual inhabitant. ---
**Author:** ![JohnBckWLD](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/d6d6ee/32.png) [@JohnBckWLD](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnBckWLD)\ **Post date:** [April 26, 2005, 5:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kubricks-the-shining/299743/65 "2005-04-26T17:40:08Z")
OK, once again, according to that puzzle site:…The Shining ends with an extremely long camera shot moving down a hallway in the Overlook, reaching eventually the central photo among 21 photos on the wall. The caption reads: “Overlook Hotel-July 4th Ball-1921.” The answer to this puzzle, which is a master key to unlocking the whole movie, is that most Americans overlook the fact that July Fourth was no ball, nor any kind of Independence day, for native Americans…My curiousity got the best of me. Putting inane Indian theories aside, **What is your interpretation of the 7/4/21 Ball Phototraph?** (A theory from someone who never read the King book): The old photo in the final scene was simply used to reinforce the fact the Overlook was haunted. Nothing more - nothing less. Similar to the ghosts at the party & Lloyd the bartender, the spirits of the two ‘shiners’ who axed their families haunt the Overlook Hotel year round. ---
**Author:** ![want2know](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/50afbb/32.png) [@want2know](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/want2know)\ **Post date:** [April 26, 2005, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kubricks-the-shining/299743/66 "2005-04-26T22:29:42Z")
Besides being one of the most BORING movies I have ever seen, I believe that this film is solely responsible for inspiring writers of pseudo-horror like M Night Shovel-it. In fact, “The Shining” was the worst excuse for a horror film I had ever seen–until I saw “Signs”. I mean, talk about the stupidest ending since Stephen King’s “It”! ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [April 26, 2005, 11:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kubricks-the-shining/299743/67 "2005-04-26T23:02:24Z")
> [@JohnBckWLD](#): > > Putting inane Indian theories aside, > > **What is your interpretation of the 7/4/21 Ball Phototraph?** > > (A theory from someone who never read the King book): The old photo in the final scene was simply used to reinforce the fact the Overlook was haunted. Nothing more - nothing less. Similar to the ghosts at the party & Lloyd the bartender, the spirits of the two ‘shiners’ who axed their families haunt the Overlook Hotel year round. I might very well be the only one but I think it’s an indication that some events in the hotel don’t exist at any _one_ point in time. Sort of like the Future Echoes episode of “Red Dwarf”. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kubricks-the-shining/299743.md?page=3)