Crushing disappointment

Rating: Null/10 (7 January 2009)

I had read Stephen King's "The Shining" once previously, in high school, before picking it up from the library last week and giving it another go. I didn't remember much about it, and oddly was more familiar with the film thanks to pop culture than I was with the book, having all but forgotten that I even read it. As over-written and even melodramatic as King's novel is, it is a genuinely intelligent, viscerally creepy (thanks to some stunningly effective psycho-sexual imagery, mainly), meditation on a family falling apart, a man's descent into madness and his battle with alcoholism, and it also develops the Overlook Hotel as a menacing entity all on its own, another character in the novel, if you will. By taking the time to develop genuine characters and a genuinely creepy setting, it ends up being a very rewarding experience. It's also written with real passion; Jack Torrance in the novel was autobiographical, as King was struggling to contain his alcohol addiction and angry outbursts at his family.
However, I am not keen on faithfulness in adapting literature, not when it's done for the sake of being faithful anyway, so I was actually fairly excited to see what Stanley Kubrick, an artist who is better at his craft than King is at his (although I will always defend King as a genuinely talented author), would come up with, and excited to finally see a film I had heard so much about but never actually sat down and watched. Kubrick is a great artist and you have to respect his approach to most things because he makes them his own and usually makes them very worthwhile.
Sadly, while I can't call "The Shining" a bad film, because it is quite entertaining (although at least 70% of the time for all the wrong reasons), and is an absolute marvel on a technical, visual level, and boasts a better finale (well, before the idiotic final shot anyway) than the novel's, it is disappointingly empty for a Kubrick film, and beyond just that doesn't even deliver on its own terms as a horror thriller. The phenomenal cinematography and camera work, as well as the typically (for a Kubrick film) excellent design make the film very atmospheric, but all the 'scary' bits, hyped by fans of the film as some of the finest moments in film history, are really absolutely nothing more than just more 'jump' moments, typical of most horror movies ever made. There's no psychology at work here, just cheap, boring, silly jump moments. The only jump moment in the film that actually is sort of effective is one which employs a bit of unsettling psycho-sexual imagery, but it's fleeting and uses a character who was used to far more disturbing effect in the novel. There is no need for workmanlike faithfulness when adapting a story for the screen, but if you have something that already provides unsettling imagery which is based on some very basic human fears and paranoias common to a lot of us, why on earth replace it with silly nonsense?
The script is an absolute disaster, outside of some good dialogue. The characters are not used as effective archetypes, they are mere caricatures. Jack Torrance is, before he goes after everyone with an axe, just a damned prick. Wendy is one of the most annoying 'characters' in film history, characterized as a timid, whiny brat, although that also has a lot to do with Shelley Duvall's truly unbearable 'acting'. The kid, Danny, is just an obnoxious brat, and the actor they picked to play him is beyond abysmal. Moreover, there is the utterly retarded decision to have Tony live in his mouth (in his mouth!), and have the blasted kid go on and on in a silly voice, pointing at his mouth while doing so. Was him going on repeating 'redrum' supposed to be frightening? Egad! Nicholson is forced by the script to play a one-dimensional caricature even early in the film, and does a half-decent job, but when he does go nuts and starts chasing everybody it's a phenomenally mad, over-the-top performance and truly enjoyable and iconic, and immediately improves the film's entertainment value, if not its artistic value. The last half hour or so, bar the final shot, is startlingly effective following the unintentional hilarity of most of what had just passed.
I'd love to at least say that "The Shining" was well-directed, but I'm afraid that even that praise can't extend beyond the visuals. I have immense respect for Stanley Kubrick, but he is partly responsible for Duvall's performance and for the kid's performance. His work as writer is what is truly disappointing however, as his additions and subtractions from the original work make no sense at all. You should go into a Kubrick film, specifically an adaptation of a literary work, expecting it to be quite different to the work being adapted. I really did expect something different to King's novel. I did, however, expect Kubrick to do something with the material that didn't ultimately amount to completely dumbing it down for the masses, especially not when the work he's adapting is populist enough as it is!
The problem with this film isn't that it doesn't work as an adaptation (as many King fans say), but that it doesn't even work on its own terms. There's no tension here, no menace, because there's no development of anything at all. Jack's already mad when he arrives, 'the shining' itself is barely even mentioned, and the Overlook isn't developed or anything of the sort- it's just there, and it's only creepy because every so often Kubrick has the brilliant, never-before-thought-of idea to have something pop up and then disappear. A technically excellent film, but the script and performances ruin it. The hedge maze is lovely though, and the chase which occurs there is spectacular.