Weird People in a Weird House.

Rating: 2/10 (2 May 1999)

I suppose that every classic movie has its detractors, and I'm afraid I'm one of these for The Shining. Didn't like it. First of all, I'll confess that Stanley Kubrick is not my favorite director, and the geriatric-snail pace of this movie reminded me of the time I rented 2001: Space Odyssey, another Kubrick film that didn't care whether it got my attention or not.
Unlike other Stephen King stories that have been brought to film, this movie does a very poor job of defining the evil that our heroes/heroines must face. There are a few lines of dialogue at the beginning about caretaker Grady, but not much more then that before the weirdness starts. We don't know exactly why Jack goes insane, and it seems as though we're expected not to care.
This screenplay is very light on heroes, too. Jack obviously is not one, and Wendy spends the entire film looking like she's missed several AA/drug rehab meetings. Even little Danny, the boy who has the gift of "Shining" began to get extremely annoying with his chanting "redrum" constantly towards the end of the film. The result of these bizarre, hysterical, annoying and unattractive tendencies meant that by the film's end, I didn't care whether or not any of the characters lived or died. There really was nobody for me to cheer for. The character of Dick Halloran was the closest thing to a hero, but like anyone who struts into a mayhem-infested house announcing his presence, he was just a little too dumb to survive this flick.
Many accolades have been given to the film's music. I don't know why. It sounded as if the producers were really trying to save money, and hired a few kindergartners to bang on pots and pans for some key sequences.
Jack Nicholson's acting was one of the two redeeming factors for me. His (unexplained) disintegration into a maniac is horrifying to watch, and it defines Nicholson's status as one of the best actors of the 20th century. However, I think he was misused in this film. The character always seemed to be slightly nasty, and by the end of the film I got the feeling that the character really wasn't going crazy, he was always this mean and just letting it show in it's entirety now time.
The other enjoyable piece of this film was the camerawork, particularly the sequences that involved the camera chasing Danny's bike around.
Didn't like the film, and I probably won't see it again. I'm just happy I can now recognize the classic scenes that came from it.