Stunning visuals but lacks the heart of the novel

Rating: 8/10 (9 April 2018)

I'm a big Stephen King fan so I am a bit biased but having read the book a year ago I though enough time has passed for me to watch the movie. I'm also a fan of Kubrick and his movies work on me every time, he can combine music and visuals in a way that no one else can to create a sense of dread. He is a master when it comes to making me feel uneasy, most of his movies aren't horror but a lot of the scenes feel like horror scenes and are more scary than actual horror movies. After seeing The Shining I still think Eyes Wide Shut is his scariest movie, one that got under my skin the most but the Shining has plenty of great moments of tension and creepiness. Due to that I still really enjoyed the movie, more so the second half than the first, it looks great and the music is fantastic but I have to say the book is just much better.
In the book Jack Torrance is a fascinating character, a guy trying to fight his demons and turn his life around to provide for his family, he gradually turns crazy throughout the book due to the paranormal forces of the Overlook. I don't know if in the movie Kubrick wanted to make Jack plain crazy or if this is just Jack Nicholson's acting but the character is purely one dimensional, right from the start he is unstable and it seems as if he is bringing his family deliberately to the Overlook so that he can dispose of them and pretend as if it was an accident. The book is a great family drama, a tragic story which makes you feel a lot of sympathy and sadness towards Jack even when he is on his murderous rampage. The movie doesn't do that at all, he is just a typical psycho, you could replace him with Michael Myers from Halloween and you'd have the same result. I have to say that Jack Nicholson does play crazy really well and provides some great moments of dark humor.
On the other hand I think the movie did a great job adding some imagery like the twins and the blood pouring from the elevator and it was a good choice to not do the topiary animals as they wouldn't have translated well to film. All in all I don't dislike it as much as Stephen King apparently does himself but I just think the book has a lot more heart and tells a much more compelling, sad story whilst the movie looks absolutely gorgeous and oozes great creepy atmosphere but doesn't deliver a satisfying story.