The Shining

“HERE’S JOHNNY!” The Shining is just great. Jack Nicholson gives a powerhouse performance as Jack Torrance, treading a fine line between silly and terrifying. Shelly Duvall is just as amazing, carving herself onto the Mount Rushmore of horror final girls, alongside your Laurie Strodes, Sidney Prescotts, and Ellen Ripley’s. She simply nails Wendy’s sheer terror, Just as precisely as Nicholson does Torrance’s insanity. The cherry on top is Danny Lloyd, who gives one of the great child performances, period, alongside Regan and John Connors of The Excorcist and Terminator 2: Judgement Day fame. He’s seriously unnerving in this. The whole movie is, really. It just has this unusual, uncanny vibe, and said feeling is amplified even more so by The Overlook hotel itself. It’s one of the most iconic locations in all of cinema, let alone horror. The way it utilises liminality and the eery feeling of nostalgia creates a very disturbing atmosphere, and its absolutely nonsense architecture creates a dreadful sense of uncertainty. A feeling you don’t want to be having when being chased down by your crazy husband wielding an axe. Seriously, the last 30 odd minutes of this film are jaw-dropping, and craft one of the most iconic chases in all of horror. But.. that’s the problem. I’ve been absolutely GLAZING this movie to the max, but there’s a reason this is no 5 star movie. Its iconic moments are iconic for a reason. They’re the best parts of the movie. In this pretty chunky 2 hour and 20 minute watch, a decent amount of runtime gets.. strangely boring? Maybe it’s just because I’ve seen this before, but certain sequences seemed to drag. I’m aware that this feeling might stem from the fact that this movie features ALOT of tracking shots, but I don’t know. It gets a bit repetitive. I am low on sleep, to be fair. Felt like Jack Torrance istg Overall a really good film, and it’s obvious why this in the pantheon of horror movies. I’ve only watched two Kubrick movies (this and Paths of Glory) but I’m pretty confident in saying I fuck with him. I did prefer Paths of Glory, though.