HALLOWEEN REVIEW OF THE DAY: The Shining (1980)

Today's review features a classic from my favorite director Stanley Kubrick. The Shining, based on a novel by Stephen King, follows a delusional writer named Jack Torrance, played by the great Jack Nicholson, and his family while they overlook a hotel during the winter as supernatural occurrences and cabin fever ensues. Like many great horror films, this film has a disturbing and an uncomfortable tone throughout giving the audience a hint of what to prepare for. Jack Nicholson like always is great as this type of character. The character Jack Torrance from the start is just a ticking time bomb, and you never know when he will finally snap and what can cause him to. From the beginning he is like this, because he is not like normal men. He has this odd and deranged sense of humor and you can tell that he is not thrilled about his family life with his wife and troubled son. The spooks of the hotel make him go off the edge of sanity and it is like the ghosts or hallucinations of the hotel are on his side and encouraging him to do the maniacal acts he's going to do in the future. But as much as I enjoyed Jack Nicholson's character, I also enjoyed the character of Jack's wife, played by Shelley Duvall. By the beginning she is a naive, nimble, and timid housewife who just wants to please her husband. But as the story progresses she becomes more aware of what is happening to Jack and she starts to defend herself more and be more adult, so she successfully saves herself from falling into the "damsel in distress" category. One last thing I want to praise the Stanley Kubrick's success as the director of this classic. Like many of his films, Kubrick is a genius of deciding shots for his film and how they should look. Sure most of the time they seem surreal and uncomfortable but I have a liking to the oddness of it because the more the setting and scenery stands out, the more original it is in my opinion. Plus it does feel like you have entered in another world, a world of Kubrick's vision. Mix in the talents of a genius director, with creepy visuals, and a chilling and suspenseful horror story, The Shining continues to be my definite favorite in the genre. Grade: E