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Bookmark this pageThe Shining (1980)
Director: Stanley Kubrick
Movie review
From Time Out Film Guide
If you go to this adaptation of Stephen King's novel expecting to see a horror movie, you'll be disappointed. From the start, Kubrick undercuts potential tension builders by a process of anti-climax; eerie aerial shots accompanied by ponderous music prove to be nothing more than that; the setting is promising enough - an empty, isolated hotel in dead-of-winter Colorado - but Kubrick makes it warm, well-lit and devoid of threat. Granted, John Alcott's cinematography is impressive, and occasionally produces a 'look behind you' panic; but to hang the movie's psychological tension on the leers and grimaces of Nicholson's face (suited though it is to demoniacal expressions), while refusing to develop any sense of the man, is asking for trouble. Similarly, the narrative is too often disregarded in favour of crude and confusing visual shocks. Kubrick's unbalanced approach (over-emphasis on production values) results in soulless cardboard cutouts who can do little to generate audience empathy.Author: FF
User reviews of this film
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- Tom said...
- Posted on May 16 2009 17:16 Kubrick's eerie horror genre piece remains spooky decades later. Comments that he does not explore character psychology are true for most if not all of his films - it is the Kubrick style (or intent or flaw, depending on your perspective) that his characters are portrayed as slightly dehumanized. Would you degrade masterpieces such as Dr. Strangelove or 2001 because we don't have a true sense of the inner machinations for the leads?
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- caleb said...
- Posted on May 15 2009 14:54 I agree with this review. While some of the imagery is memorable, as with other Kubrick films, the story and character development makes me wish he'd kept himself to cinematography.
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Cast & crew
Director: Stanley Kubrick
Producer: Stanley Kubrick
Cast: Jack Nicholson, Shelley Duvall, Danny Lloyd, Scatman Crothers, Barry Nelson, Philip Stone, Joseph Turkel, Anne Jackson full cast
Genre(s): Horror
Duration: 146 mins
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