A Less-Than-Lustrous "Shining" That Could've Used A Buff'n'Polish Job

Rating: 4/10 (7 October 2011)

Yawn.... Like, was this so-called "horror" movie really supposed to be scary? Was it!!??
Why does it seem to me that about every story that's ever been adapted for the screen from a frickin' Stephen King novel has somehow been destined to become a pathetic, little dud? Eh? Why?
And, yeah, I know (all too well) that Stanley Kubrick was considered to be one of the absolute greatest Directors of his time, but, all the same, The Shining was an unquestionable misfire on his part.
My opinion about The Shining's dud-factor comes from a clearly obvious flaw in Kubrick's directorial abilities. Yep. That's right. Put quite plainly, Kubrick did not, I repeat, did not understand the genre of Horror, at all.
Had Kubrick comprehended the Horror genre to its fullest, then The Shining would've (most definitely) ranked right up there (in my books) with such brilliant horror classics as The Innocents (1961) and The Haunting (1963). But, unfortunately, Horror was not Kubrick's forte and this sadly showed, like a literal black-eye, in The Shining's final product.
It didn't help matters much that actor Jack Nicholson was cast in the lead role. As the caretaker, Jack Torrance, Nicholson, like some amateur comic, went right off the wall at warp-speed and this preposterous transformation of his left us no bloody time to get involved in his plight.
Yes. The Shining did deliver some mighty eerie moments throughout its rather lengthy story, but the overall effect of horror was, ultimately, a pretty dismal one. And being offered this sort of mediocrity just wasn't satisfactory enough for me to stay very interested, in the long run.
To add insult to injury, I quickly found that I couldn't stand the kid who played Danny Torrance. Yeah. This irritating, little brat really got on my nerves, like you wouldn't believe. And, besides that - Well, let's face it - Danny's supposed ability to "shine" really ended up having very little to do with the story, anyways.
All-in-all - When each one of these negative elements that I've described above were all thrown together and combined into The Shining's mix they clearly produced one of the dullest horror movies that I've ever seen.
Yep. A very forgettable film, indeed.