It hasn't aged well

Rating: 6/10 (7 September 2003)

I checked out "The Shining" on DVD and was disappointed to realize that it hasn't aged well since the last time I'd seen it. It had always been one of my favorite movies and probably my favorite Stanley Kubrick film, but several things troubled me on seeing it again recently. In fact, I shut the player off and didn't even finish the movie.
To be blunt, the movie opens in terribly boring fashion, a series of static head shots involving Jack Nicholson and two actors of zero charisma. I refer to the scene in which Mr. Ullman explains to Jack Torrance the horrific history of the Overlook Hotel. Frankly, today it looks like amateurish filmmaking as it is nothing more than people talking and reacting to what they're hearing. Given Kubrick's mastery of the image, couldn't he have found a more visual way of giving us the Overlook's backstory? I think of how Peter Jackson handled the backstory in "Fellowship of the Ring," and "The Shining" just looks so made-for-TV by comparison.
The movie is so static, so dialogue-driven, that I can't imagine how it played on the big screen. As I was 10 years old in 1980, I've only seen "The Shining" on TV. I'm afraid it might be more at home on the small screen, given Kubrick's curious preference for a locked-down camera and predictable editing style.
Something else totally kicked me out of the movie. As Ullman is touring the Torrances around the grounds, they come to the Snowcat, and he asks, "Can both of you drive a car?" What the hell? Why wouldn't Wendy be able to drive? Was this movie made in 1957? It's a tiny point, but I just couldn't go on with a movie that had aged so terribly over just 23 years.
Intellectually, I know this is a film of superior intelligence and great style. It's just that the style played better 15 years ago than it does today. Here's a suggestion: Peter Jackson should do a remake. He could really do a great job with the story, blending Stephen King's terrific characterizations and settings with seamless special effects that would terrify and enthrall today's audiences.
Too bad it'll never happen.