Sarah Nguyen
Professor Suarez
English 1302
24, September 2015 Shining The Shining is a film that leaves many of it’s viewers confused and a little bit angry. There are so many hidden clues and symbolic pieces to this film that leaves most people question what’s going on in Kubricks head. The plot of the story is straight forward, it’s about a family that takes care of a gigantic hotel in Colorado that turns the father insane due to isolation and he eventually tries to kill his family. It sounds like a simple horror film that most people have seen but the meaning behind this film has made people think about what the true meaning of the horror film could be. Bill Blakemore, Juli Kearns, Geoffrey Cocks, Jay Weidner , and John Fell Ryan explain their different theories about what Kubrick really want to show his views. Some of them make sense, some of them make the reader skeptical, and some of them are totally off but they all bring together the fact that Kubrick’s film the Shining was one of the greatest films out there. One of the first theories brought up was about the American Indians and how Jack becoming insane and deciding to kill his whole family related to the Americans killing the Indians. The whole infrastructure of the hotel was brought up with many references to the indians from where the hotel was built on the burial grounds and the interior design of the hotel. I agree with Bill Balkemore’s theory about the Indians because it does show the progression of Jack getting pressured into killing his family as an analogy to the pressure the settlers had to exterminate the indians in order to make it in the new world. They came to this new world and were dying left and right due to disease, no resources, and weather. Coming into the land of the free meant invading the indians property without and remorse and that’s where i can see the relation to the film. There was a lot of invading going on in the film that made me think of the relation to the settlers and the indians. Jack’s family starts off by invading a hotel they have no clue about, the previous care taker Grady invades Jack’s mind into killing his family and the hotel chef Dick invades Danny’s mind and shows him the meaning of ‘The Shine’. One last point that makes the relation to the indians is that the treaty of Jack and Grady was broken when he was locked in the pantry. The staggered Calumet cans were a sign of dishonestly and it makes a lot of sense how Grady confronted Jack about not trying hard enough to kill his wife. It all comes back to the treaty broken with the settlers and the indians when John Smith betrayed all the indians after he gained their trust to survive in the new land. Next theory that made sense to me was about the nazi’s and Hilter. Geoffrey Cocks first brings up the type writer and how it is a german brand. That brings to my attention that the whole basis of Jack and his family going to the hotel in the first place was for him to be isolated and to write his novel. We can see that he spends most of his time either typing or sitting by his type writer. It was significant to the story because it started as such a pure idea and ended up as the thing that made him snap. Cocks also brings up that the type writer is white at first and changes color to a dark grey by the end of the movie, that to me symbolizes again the purity of why he decided to stay at the hotel at first to his new mission. I agree with this theory because of how much red is put into this film;the red clothes, to the red walls and to ultimately the red of the blood coming out of the elevators. All of the blood that is represented in this film can be tied to all the blood lost from the jews in the holocaust. John Fell Ryan talks a lot about placement of props and the way the extras are put in the film to tell hidden clues. I personally do not understand where he was going with his theory. He talks a lot about how the shots were going into the distance to blur out to another scene to emphasize on something else. I did not relate to the how the details of such things made an impact on what the plot of the film meant. I assume that the opening credits were just to give a lay of the land to the later things that happen in the film like the maze but Ryan doesn’t talk about a theory. He just points out what is there and how the timing of things make a difference but to what? There was the theory about Jack living his past life again. He says he knows Lloyd and he knows Grady from some where but there was no given as to where Jack has seen them before. The scene from when he first sees Grady there is a ball going on where everyone is dressed up in 1920’s dresses and Jack seems to just fit right in to it like he’s been there before. This theory of him living the past and reliving it in a dream makes sense, and what ties it all in is the end picture of Jack in the front of the picture that is dated in 1921. The past becomes the nightmare as one of the theorist says, and “the only way you can get out of it is the retrace your steps and to shine your way out of your troubles.” I agree with this due to the fact that many of the things that happen in the Shining seem to all pan out in Danny and Wendy’s favor, nothing really bad happens to them at all during the movie because Danny is shining his way through all the events that are going on. He shines when Wendy and Jack are fighting down by the type writer and she is swinging her bat to defend herself and ultimately wins that fight. The movie title is Shining for a reason and it’s a positive connotation for the most part. Jack relives his past to get out of his nightmare life and give his family a new life away from himself. The Labyrinth theory is one that I disagree with the most due to the fact that there was only a couple supporting details that Juli Kearns mentioned. The only point she made was about the hedge maze and how Jack’s face looked like a minotaur, it didn’t make any sense to tie in the fable of the labyrinth to the horror film. The theory that made the most sense to me was that this film was based off of sexual demons. Room 237 was what scared everyone the most, that was because the room was derived of a persons worse fears. There was a bit of foreshadowing and John Fell Ryan actually pointed it out but didn’t really elaborate on the subject about the playgirl magazine and on the cover it had an article about incest. There is a lot of speculation about Jack sexually molesting Danny that’s why he was hurt. We hear the story twice, once from Wendy and once from Jack but the way Wendy told the story to the psychiatrist made it seem like she did not believe any words she coming out of her mouth, almost like she was holding back the fear behind the secrets of that night. Another things this theory mention but didn’t explain further was the bath tub scene in room 237. One of the theorist mentioned the disturbing sexuality that are in this movie and I agree fully on room 237 to be the main point of the sexual reality of what is going on with this family. This really stuck with me because that room was a reflection of each characters and how they became the victims of the hotel. The first person to go in that room was Danny. His sexual fears resided in that room so much that it actually strangled him. That mark on his neck symbolizes his struggle to speak up about his father molesting him. Tony was his only way of communicating about the things Danny couldn’t bear to speak of. Jack went into room 237 with the temptation of the naked women, she lured him into his sexual demons and eventually showed him about his fear of the sexual defiance he does on Danny. Apart of him snaps and he wants to forget that part of himself that’s why he told Wendy there was nothing in there. There was another big indicator about the molestation of Danny when Wendy is running trying to find Danny she stumbles upon the bear with the man in the 1920’s suit. This is Wendy finally realizing what Jack has been doing to Danny, this is her sexual fears arising out from that room. I agree with the theory of all the demons of this family just pouring out because Wendy has been always submissive to Jack, he yells at her and she basically takes it all. She finally realized that the her child has been abused by his own father and that ties in with the playgirl magazine. The magazine shows the incest article and it foreshadows Jack’s hidden skeleton. Of the many theories given in the documentary Room 237 some made a lot of sense to me and made me think more in depth of what Kubrick could have meant with the vague horror film. There were other theories that made no sense to me as to how these people got their ideas from. The one theory that I would have to agree with the most would be the theory of sexual sadism upon Jack’s hidden secret with Danny. This gave me the best understanding as to why Jack started to snap, how Danny was able to shine, the reason why Tony was in Danny’s life and the reason behind the bear suit. In conclusion, this is a horror film about a man who murders his family, and it’s sole purpose was to leave audiences searching for answers to a mystery that has no solution.