A scary movie with artistic merit

Rating: 9/10 (3 June 2008)

This is a movie I highly regard, namely for demonstrating some great artistic merit (some other movies in this category are "Cat People", "A clockwork orange" and "The baby of Macon", which I've also reviewed here).
When I first saw this movie as a teenager, I must say I was very disappointed, as it was a movie that was hyped for its shock value, and I didn't find it that shocking.
Anyway, the plot of the movie concerns a family who move into a hotel during winter to act as caretakers during the off season. The father is a man who has struggled with alcoholism in the past. His son seems to have some sort of sixth sense, which gives him some very disturbing 'visions' in the hotel.
As winter sets in and the isolation becomes more pronounced for the father, he returns to drinking. He starts behaving erratically and violently and may be interacting with his own demons or actual demons in the hotel.
I don't want to give away too much more about this movie. In the past, I tended to think of "The dead zone" as the best adaptation from a Stephen King novel. Having seen The Dead Zone many years later, it struck me as being little more than a midday movie.
So, what made me change my mind about The Shining? One scene. It's the scene where the caretaker's son rides his tricycle inside the hotel...over floorboards and carpet. It struck me as great art-the sheer acoustic sensuality of the sound of the wheels travelling over various textures.
It's odd, I know, but I really value that kind of art in a movie.
The movie does contain some very creepy scenes, so it is not just a horror movie with artistic flourishes. I'm sure that many of the scenes will haunt you for a while.
Just by the by, some years ago, I saw a mini-series of this story, which had Stephen King's involvement. I must say, I did find King's own mini-series to be really awful-especially the ending. Normally novellists complain bitterly about directors ruining their vision. In this case, it was all King's doing.