The Shining

The Shining (1980)

2:24 (144 min)

Horror, Thriller

United Kingdom, United States

8.3/10
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All about film

Video 42

Photo 414

Actors and characters

1:36

Photo 414

Production

Hawk Films, Peregrine, The Producer Circle Co.

Release date

23 May 1980

Budget

$19 000 000

Revenue

$50 312 025

Director

Stanley Kubrick

Scenario

Stephen King

Author

Composer

Wendy Carlos

Producer

Stanley Kubrick

All team (74)

Actors

Jack Nicholson

Jack Torrance

Shelley Duvall

Wendy Torrance

Danny Lloyd

Danny

Scatman Crothers

Hallorann

Barry Nelson

Ullman

Philip Stone

Grady

Joe Turkel

Lloyd

Anne Jackson

Doctor

All actors and roles (10)

• As in the book, the screenplay included a scene where Jack finds an album with newspaper clippings about the hotel. For unknown reasons, this scene was never properly filmed, however, the album can still be seen in the frame. It lies next to the typewriter in the scene when Jack tells Wendy not to disturb him while he is working.
• The hedge maze was built on an airfield near the "Elstree studios".
• According to data from "Variety", filming took almost 200 days. However, according to assistant editor Gordon Steinfeldt, filming took much longer – almost a year. Initially, it was assumed that filming would be completed in 17 weeks, but it lasted 51 weeks. Because filming was significantly delayed, Warren Beatty and Steven Spielberg had to postpone filming of "Reds" (1981) and "Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark" respectively at "Elstree Studios".
• Stanley Kubrick wanted to film the movie in chronological order. Considering the various sets prepared for the film and the action constantly moving from one set to another, absolutely all filming locations and sets made for the picture had to be available for filming at any time. Therefore, all the soundstages at "Elstree Studios" were occupied by sets for "The Shining".
• The film's script was changed so significantly during filming that Jack Nicholson stopped reading new versions, and only read the new pages he needed to perform in the next scene.
• It took about a month to film the scene where Jack chases Danny through the maze.
• In one scene, we see Danny and Wendy walking towards the center of the maze, while the camera slowly rises above them, moving higher and higher away from them. To film the scene, a miniature of the maze was built and filmed from a height of six feet (183 centimeters). After that, the central part of the maze was built to full scale next to the residential house. Shelley Duvall and Danny Lloyd wandered in the center of the maze while cameras filmed them from the roof of the building. Finally, two shots (the miniature of the entire maze and the full-scale center of the maze) were combined together.
• To film the scene near the end of the film where Wendy runs up the stairs holding a knife, 35 takes were required. During the filming of this scene, Shelley Duvall ran up the stairs a distance equal to climbing the stairs to the top of the Empire State Building.
• The room where the incredible events took place was numbered 217, but the hotel owners asked the filmmakers to change one digit to 237, as they feared future guests would be afraid to stay in that "cursed" room.
• Initially, Stanley Kubrick wanted Carey Guffey to play the role of Danny.
• Kubrick's work pace slowed down significantly after "Barry Lyndon," and he made only one more film over the next five years. Stanley Kubrick spent a long time searching for a suitable book to film. Every half hour or hour, loud thuds would come from the director's office—having started a new novel, Kubrick would throw books against the wall after several dozen pages. One morning the thuds stopped, and a frightened secretary tried to contact her boss via intercom, but received no response. Fearing Stanley had a heart problem, she burst into his office and found Kubrick reading "The Shining." He waved the novel and said, "This is the one."
• Kubrick wanted to shoot 70 takes for the scene of Dick Hallorann's murder, but after the fortieth take, Jack Nicholson persuaded him to show respect to Scatman Crothers, who was 69 years old and on the verge of a breakdown.
• The scene where Wendy brings Jack breakfast in bed is shot as a reflection in a mirror. Here you can see that Jack's t-shirt says "Stovington." While this is never mentioned in the film, in the book, "Stovington" is the name of the school where Jack used to work.
• Filming began on May 1, 1978, and ended in April 1979.
• The phrase that Jack types repeatedly on the typewriter – “All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy” – Kubrick specifically had printed in the relevant languages for foreign versions and then filmed, with footage from which went into the corresponding releases. In Italian, it is “Il mattino ha l' oro in bocca” (“The morning has gold in its mouth”), in German – “Was Du heute kannst besorgen, das verschiebe nicht auf Morgen” (“Never put off until tomorrow what you can do today”), in Spanish – “No por mucho madrugar amanece mas temprano” (“Getting up early doesn’t make the dawn come sooner”), and in French – “Un 'Tiens' vaut mieux que deux 'Tu l’auras'” (“A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush”).
• The original version, released in theaters in 1980, had an alternate ending: after the shot of Jack's body, there was a scene with police outside the hotel. This was followed by a scene in the hospital where Wendy and Danny are located. Ullman arrives at the hospital and informs them that they were unable to find Jack's body. Before leaving the hospital, Ullman throws Danny a tennis ball – the very same ball that rolled to Danny while he was playing in the hotel corridors. Ullman laughs and exits the hospital, and the camera smoothly transitions to the final shot of the photograph. Stanley Kubrick cut the ending a week after the film's theatrical release.
• For the scene where Jack breaks down the bathroom door, lightweight doors were made, which Jack Nicholson, who had volunteered as a firefighter, broke too easily. After several takes, new, heavier and more substantial doors had to be made.
• To achieve the desired result from Shelley Duvall, Stanley Kubrick demanded before the start of filming that no one on the set show sympathy, support, or pay compliments to Shelley. Kubrick himself nitpicked at every detail in her acting, constantly keeping her in a heightened state. It even went so far that the director, in front of the entire crew, would yell at Shelley, saying she was wasting his time and the time of the film crew. Later, Duvall agreed that Kubrick did everything possible to achieve the most realistic acting from her, and she does not blame him for the methods he used.
• In the scenes where we hear Jack typing, but don't see what he's typing, Kubrick demanded that the sound of a typewriter typing the phrase “All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy” be recorded. The reason was that Kubrick had heard somewhere that each key on a typewriter sounds different, so he wanted to achieve maximum authenticity.
• In a conversation with Lloyd, Jack mentions Portland, Maine. Stephen King grew up in that city.
• The Timberline Lodge in Oregon was used as the exterior of the Overlook Hotel for panoramic shots. All interior scenes were filmed on sets at Elstree Studios in England, none of which resemble the real interior of the hotel. A set was also built for the outdoor scene showing the grounds with the labyrinth, based on the southern part of the Lodge. The Colorado Lounge set was based on the interior of the Ahwahnee Hotel in Yosemite National Park. The set differs from the actual lounge mainly in that the fireplace is located on a completely different side and lacks a staircase. The Ahwahnee's lobby also served as the basis for the Overlook's lobby with its red columns. The Colorado Lounge set was later used by Steven Spielberg in "Raiders of the Lost Ark." The two elevators from the scene with the blood streams were also copied from the elevators at the Ahwahnee.
• The full version of the film has a runtime of 146 minutes.
• When Garrett Brown, the cinematographer and inventor of the Steadicam, was invited to work on the film, he was assured that filming would last a maximum of six months, as he needed to return to the United States, where filming of "Rocky II" (1979) was starting at that time. When only half of the material had been filmed after six months, Garrett had to work on "The Shining" for several months, one week at a time, and on "Rocky" for one week at a time, constantly flying between England and the United States.
• Danny Lloyd himself suggested that his character move his finger while talking to Tony.
• On the baseball bat Wendy hits Jack with, in one of the shots you can see the signature of Carl Yastrzemski, a famous player for the "Red Sox" team, a devoted fan of whom is Stephen King.
• For the role of Jack, Kubrick considered Robert De Niro and Robin Williams. He later rejected both candidates because, in his opinion, De Niro was not psychotic enough for the role, while Williams, conversely, was too psychotic.
• The famous scene where streams of blood gush from the elevator doors was filmed for a whole year before Kubrick finally liked the take where, in his opinion, there could be no doubt that blood was gushing on the screen.
• Interested in the film’s production, Stanley Kubrick, failing to account for the time difference, called Stephen King early in the morning. King, suffering from a terrible hangover, was, to say the least, shocked to hear Kubrick’s voice on the other end of the line, who immediately began to share ideas about adapting the book for the screen.
• The film that Wendy and Danny are watching is “Summer of ‘42” (1971).
• The scene where Hallorann rides to the hotel during a blizzard on a snowmobile was filmed during a blizzard on the road to the "Timberline" hotel in Oregon.
• According to actress Anjelica Huston, who was living with Nicholson at the time, working on the film was so exhausting for him that he would fall into bed and immediately fall asleep upon returning from the set.
• Wendy Carlos and Rachel Elkind wrote the electronic soundtrack for the film, which was almost completely rejected by Stanley Kubrick. Only the music in the opening credits and a few minor elements throughout the film remained from their soundtrack.
• The film was one of the first to use the 'Steadicam' camera stabilization system in its filming. Some scenes where the camera moves (Danny's rides through the corridors on a tricycle, Danny and Wendy's walk through the maze, Danny fleeing from Jack there) were filmed using this device. The system's inventor, Garrett Brown, took a full part in the filming as one of the operators, and published an article about it in 'American Cinematographer' magazine. Almost all shots of Danny were filmed 'from the hip' – that is, at a child's eye level. Kubrick did this to show the surroundings precisely from Danny's point of view (Steven Spielberg later used this effect in his famous film 'E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial'). For these scenes, Garrett Brown attached the camera not to the upper, but to the lower platform of the 'Steadicam' system, specifically designed for shooting from a low angle. At the same time, the counterweight with the monitor was attached to the upper platform. Thanks to this, he could walk freely during filming, standing at his full height, while the camera was located at his knee level. During breaks in filming, Brown would remove the camera from the platform and seat Danny Lloyd there, as the boy weighed almost as much as the equipment.
• Around 5,000 people auditioned for the role of Danny.
• The man with the bloodied face who frightens Wendy with the shout “Having a ball, aren’t we?!” is film editor Norman Gay.
• It took 50 takes to get the shot of the tennis ball rolling towards Danny's toys.
• Stephen King did not approve of Shelley Duvall for the role of Wendy. King believed that Wendy was a stereotypical blonde who had never faced real hardships in her life. He felt that Shelley was too vulnerable and had seen too much in life, which was the complete opposite of the character in his mind.
• The 1921 photograph at the end of the film is authentic, with only one change: Jack Nicholson's head was “attached” to the body of another person. Initially, Stanley Kubrick intended to gather extras and take a photograph, but later he decided that nothing could be better than a genuine photograph.
• Grady (Philip Stone) does not blink once throughout the film.
• Stanley Kubrick abandoned the idea of creating a hedge maze in the shape of various animals that would “come to life” in certain scenes due to the imperfection of special effects at the time of filming.
• In January 2010, American conspiracy theorist Jay Weidner posted an article on his website revealing many, in his opinion, hidden allusions in the film (in particular, that the Apollo 11 landing was pre-recorded by Kubrick). He claims that he specifically contacted the management of the Timberline Lodge hotel, who told him that room 237 had always been in their hotel.
• Danny repeats "Redrum" 43 times before his mother wakes him up.
• Despite numerous negative reviews upon its release, "The Shining" is now considered by many critics to be one of the best films in the "horror" genre. According to the "American Film Institute", in 2001 the film ranked 29th on the list of "100 Scariest Movies of the Twentieth Century"; in 2003, Jack Torrance ranked 25th on the list of "100 Years... 100 Heroes and Villains". According to Channel 4, in 2003 the film topped the list of "100 Scariest Films of All Time". According to "Total Film", in 2004 "The Shining" ranked 5th on the list of "Best Horror Films". According to "Bravo TV", in 2005 the film ranked 6th on the list of "100 Scariest Moments in Cinema".
• Vivian Kubrick can be spotted in the party scene. She is wearing a black dress and is sitting on the right side of the sofa closest to the bar.
• The ending of Ridley Scott's original version of "Blade Runner" contains shots of sweeping aerial views over mountains – these shots were filmed for "The Shining" but were also cut.
• According to Shelley Duvall, it took "only" 3 days and 60 doors to film the "Here's Johnny!" scene.
• Scenes of panoramic flights showing the Torrance vehicle as the whole family drives to the hotel were actually shot for the film's opening, where only Jack travels to the hotel. Initially, Kubrick had filmed different footage using ground equipment. In those shots, the Torrance vehicle was towing a small trailer with their belongings (this would ultimately reveal to the audience how the Torrances managed to bring all the luggage shown later in the lobby in their car).
• The black chef opens the door to the pantry, pulling the handle on the right side, and in the next shot, we see him opening the door from the left side.
• The film is based on Stephen King's novel 'The Shining' (1977).
• Stephen King tried to dissuade Kubrick from casting Jack Nicholson in the lead role and suggested John Voight or Michael Moriarty instead. He argued that viewers would find it more interesting to watch an actor with an initially normal expression gradually descend into madness, rather than Nicholson, who already looked somewhat insane from the beginning of the film.
• Shelley Duvall became so exhausted during the filming of the scene where Wendy locks Jack in the pantry that she nearly fainted from strain.
• A mirror is present in every scene where Jack talks to the “ghost,” with the exception of the pantry scene where the conversation takes place through a door.
• The version including deleted scenes is mistakenly considered the director's cut, although the scenes listed below are actually from the theatrical release. Dissatisfied with the critics' reviews and box office receipts after the premiere, Kubrick cut all these moments and assembled a new version that was released in European theaters. This is why the full version of the film is often mistakenly considered the director's cut. These scenes were later inserted into the European video release of the film: An extended scene of the interview with Ullman, where Jack is introduced to Bill Watson (Barry Dennen). Ullman tells Watson that Jack used to be a schoolteacher. Jack confirms this, saying he became a writer because he wanted to change his life. Ullman then explains that 'The Overlook' closes every year from late October to May because constantly clearing snowdrifts from the roads is very expensive; The Doctor (Anne Jackson) examines Danny after Tony first shows him the threat of the 'Overlook' hotel. Their conversation reveals more detailed information about Tony. Then the Doctor and Wendy go to another room, where they have a dialogue revealing that Tony began appearing to Danny three months ago, and that’s when Wendy started smoking. It also recounts the incident where Jack dislocated Danny’s shoulder; Jack and Wendy, while inspecting the room offered to them at the hotel, enter the bathroom; Ullman, Jack, and Wendy exit the maze. Ullman informs them that the hedges of the maze are contemporaries of the hotel; Ullman shows Jack and Wendy the Gold Room, then introduces them to Dick Hallorann who has arrived there. Afterwards, one of the employees brings Danny, and they separate. Danny and Wendy leave with Hallorann, Jack with Ullman; Hallorann, showing Wendy and Danny the kitchen, asks Wendy, if her full name is Winifred, what diminutive form should he use: Winnie or Freddie?; Wendy in a robe walks through the lobby and bumps into a serving table (the scene precedes the first time the viewer sees Danny riding a bicycle through the hotel corridors); After Wendy brings Jack breakfast in bed, he tells her he has a feeling of déjà vu regarding the hotel; A brief scene 'Thursday', consisting of a single shot: Wendy, to the sound of the television, sets the table for three in the kitchen; An additional beginning to the 'Monday' scene: the viewer is shown a close-up of the television screen, showing the film 'Summer of '42' (1971) on VHS. The close-up smoothly transitions to a wide shot, revealing that the television is in the lobby. Wendy is sitting on the sofa to the left with her legs up, and Danny is on the floor to the right. At one point, Danny asks Wendy if she has seen his fire truck. Wendy replies that the truck is in their room, but she advises him not to go in there yet because Jack is still asleep. Danny says he will be quiet; An additional dialogue between Jack and the bartender; Wendy paces the room, verbally planning an escape. At one point, she hears Danny start screaming 'Redrum' in his room. She runs to him and asks him to calm down. Danny, in Tony's voice, says that Danny is not here. Wendy asks him to wake up, but Danny replies that he cannot wake up and that 'Danny is gone'; Hallorann from the airport calls a friend and arranges for a snowmobile; Danny and Wendy are sitting in the room watching television. Wendy tells her son that she will be gone for a short time to talk to Jack. Danny, in Tony's voice, says 'Okay'. As she leaves the room, Wendy discreetly takes a baseball bat; During the chase of Jack pursuing Danny through the maze, Wendy returns to the lobby (after fleeing from it, having seen a man with a bloody face) and finds that everything is covered in cobwebs, and skeletons in clothes are sitting on the sofas.
• By the time the film was released, the MPAA had already adopted a special provision prohibiting the presence of blood on screen in trailers approved for all age groups. The film’s promotional video repeatedly features a shot of blood flooding the hotel lobby. Therefore, Stanley Kubrick had to make considerable efforts to convince the MPAA that it was rust-colored water.
• Tony Burton, who played Larry Durkin, brought chess to the set. Stanley Kubrick, an avid chess player, couldn't help but notice them. Although filming was significantly behind schedule, Kubrick stopped filming for a day and spent the entire day playing chess with Tony. Burton only won one game, but Kubrick thanked him, saying he hadn't played against such a strong opponent in a long time.
• Despite consistently appearing on various lists of the scariest films of all time, the viewer only sees one murder on screen.
• There were many scenes that Kubrick rejected during editing and therefore were never released. They are known thanks to surviving photographs: Wendy prepares breakfast for Jack in the kitchen while simultaneously watching a game show on television; Wendy lies with Danny in his room on the bed and tries to calm him down (the scene followed the one where she discovered bruises on him); after Wendy pushes Danny out the bathroom window and tells him to hide, a moment was cut where Danny makes his way through the snowdrifts to the hotel’s front door.
• The Torrance's car is a Volkswagen Beetle.
• Jack Nicholson suggested that Jessica Lange play the role of Wendy.
• It took 900 tons of salt and polystyrene foam to build the snow maze at the end of the film.
• Stephen King himself did not like the film. He called Kubrick "a man who thinks too much and feels too little."
• The famous phrase “Here’s Johnny!” is an improvisation by Jack Nicholson.
• It was intended that the ball thrown by Jack at the wall would bounce off it and hit the camera lens. It took several days to achieve the desired result: almost the entire film crew participated in throwing the ball, while the camera continued to film absolutely every attempt so as not to miss the most successful one.
• The photograph "Identical Twins, Roselle, New Jersey, 1967" by Diane Arbus inspired the filmmakers to create a scene with two twin girls in the hotel corridors.
• Stanley Kubrick rejected the screenplay written by Stephen King, which too closely followed the book and differed significantly from Kubrick’s vision of the story.
• Initially, Harry Dean Stanton was supposed to play Lloyd (the bartender), but he was unable to participate in filming due to his commitment to “Alien” (1979).
• As the filming process neared completion, production began on "Star Wars: Episode V – The Empire Strikes Back" at the studio, and the artificial mountain snow covering the Overlook Hotel was later used to film scenes on the planet Hoth. Stephen King, who was present during the filming of "The Shining," visited the set of "Star Wars" and spoke with director Irvin Kershner. This was later reflected in his novel "It," where Kershner was portrayed as a character named Mrs. Kersh, who "speaks like Yoda."
• The set of the Colorado Lounge was later used by Steven Spielberg in the film "Indiana Jones: Raiders of the Lost Ark".
• A fire broke out on the set of the Colorado Lounge, where Jack works, due to the intense high temperature produced by the lighting fixtures that depicted sunlight through the windows. Fortunately, almost all of the scenes in it had been filmed by that point.
• The opening panoramic shots were filmed in Glacier National Park in Montana. The lake with a small island over which the camera flies in the very first shot is Lake Saint Mary, located there as well.
• At the end of the film, Jack Torrance breaks down the door with an axe on the right side. However, the left side of the door remains intact. But when he is distracted by the sound of the approaching snowmobile, the door in the background is broken on both sides.
• Director David Cronenberg admitted in November 2013 that he does not consider 'The Shining' a great film: “I don’t think he (Kubrick) understood the horror genre. I don’t think he understood what he was doing at all.”
• To create the interior of the Overlook Hotel, Stanley Kubrick and Roy Walker, the film's production designer, deliberately combined many interior elements from various real-life hotels. Numerous photographs of the interiors of different hotels were taken specifically for the film.
• To put the film crew in the necessary psychological state, Kubrick showed them the film "Eraserhead" (1977).
• Jack Nicholson suggested that his character throw a tennis ball against the wall. Initially, the script stated: “Jack doesn’t work.” However, Nicholson did not anticipate that he would have to throw the ball for dozens of takes, after which he could barely feel his hand.
• In the final scenes of the film, the characters run through deep snow without sinking into it at all. Considering the significant depth of the snowpack (directly mentioned in the film), this is completely unrealistic.
• According to the American Film Institute, the phrase “Here's Johnny!” ranked 68th on the list of “100 Greatest Movie Quotes of All Time.”
• The book Wendy is reading at the beginning of the film is J.D. Salinger's "The Catcher in the Rye".
• Stanley Kubrick reshot the dialogue scene between Shelley Duvall and Jack Nicholson 127 times, striving to make it perfect.

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