THE SHINING !

Daha önce ödev olarak hazırladığım ''Meek's Cutoff''u paylaşmıştım. Sırada bir diğer ödev ''The Shining'' hakkında yaptığım inceleme var. Korkmayın başka yok :)

The following paper is concerned about Stanley Kubrick’s ‘’The Shining’’ based upon the novel written by Stephan King.

In the first place I would like to cite to the locations. ‘’The Overlook Hotel’’ is situated near the top of the mountain, a place to which access is quite difficult. Throughout the journey Torrence family passes through isolated territories, all of which precariously prepares us to a story, consisting tension. (I should mention that during the journey the father, Jack Torrence tells us the old real story, which ends up with a cannibalism. So, one by one the puzzle starts to be get shaped.)

Not only the huge building itself that gives the sublimity, alerts us to the further uncanny effects but also the story told us about the building of the hotel is quite scary. It is all about the Indian graves, which doubles the uncanny effect. Graves; the ultimate symbol of chilling stories unites with Indians which alarms and makes Americans feel insecure. The double shot. Inside of the hotel is decorated by exotic Navajo and Apache motifs, but what is exotic is something unknown, too. If I should once more emphasize the name of the hotel, we may find some other readings of the movie. It is the ‘’OverLook’’, at the top of the mountain, looking to  the territtory like the statue of Jesus in Rio. Moreover, the hotel is full of Indian figures, even the construction  of it, I mean it is upon the burial ground of Indians, so the hotel, or more precisely the figure is there to judge. Super ego of the society. Lastly, people always coming and invading the terittory, Americans do not want Indians there !

And finally, the outside of the building. The labyrinth. The labyrinth is shown us twice in the movie. Wendy Torrence is walking inside it with her son and Jack at the mean time looking at the maquette of the labyrinth, suddenly camera shows us mother and son walking in it and Jack chases them with his eyes. (but he is looking at the labyrinth). Thus, may be the labyrinth is the unsonsciousness of Jack and he tries to deal with them while they are trying to go here and there, as if Jack was playing with his wife and the son in his mind. And the other scene is toward the end of the movie. Danny Torrence tries to escape from the father. Hence, only at the end of the story he tries to reach his son which ceases unsuccesfully.

If I should shift the topic from the hotel to the characters I would like to concantrate on the little boy. Danny Torrence is like the hotel itself actually, an outcast, isolated persona, has no friends and only one that speak with him is Tony, the uncanny figure, or another persona stil living in the depths of his unconsciousness. On the other hand, Tony is like the mirror of Danny, or the id of him, even something dark and chaotic. But Tony actually fills many gaps, he / it or through it Danny is able to see the future or at least feel it. So has Danny some supernatural powers, as well ? He is able to shine and speak with Dick Halloran.

Danny is being accused by Mr Grandy to bring black (nigger) man to the hotel. From an other perspective the authority (white man, Grandy) does not approve this, since If black man comes into the hotel / society some more exotic / supernatural incidents are about the happen. White man afraid of black man, he sees black as threat to the society. But Danny threats more, he is white and helps blacks.

What preoccupies my mind is three different scenes ! One of those is happening towards the end, Wendy after left by Jack at the toilet, tries to escape. While running inside the hotel, she hears some strange voices but more strikingly a bear – like clothed man an old man are together in the room, obviosuly to realize a homo-erotic love scene. But what this has got to do with the overall structure of the movie ? A: We should believe that there are some other people living in the hotel too. (Also I should emphasize that suddenly a key occured at the door of room number 237). B: Jack abuses Danny and had some insestious relationship with his son ! And this making-love scene is allusion fot that. It is quite evident that Jack is a really psychopat, even at the very beginning of the story he is abnormal, I mean his look. Furthermore, he has some sexual desires to be fed. As understood he never has a sexual intercourse with his wife and subconsciously he wants to be with the woman he sees in room number 237, additionaly he also desires to rape his wife. Taking the hammer in his hands (stands fort the penis, showing it to her) tears down the door and hammer passes through it. But what is more, the desires of Jack returned from his repressed mind only because of Danny, thus the injury (Danny got injured in room 237) makes Jake’s dream realized. ‘’All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy’’. He searches for some change, ‘’the game’’; may be the sexual intercourse. But actually dreams and fantasies are not only about sexual intercourse but also killing Wendy and Danny. At this stage I may link this idea to the Jung’s term   ‘’jouissance’’.

Wendy I'm home !

 Forseeings, dreams .. and another supernatural theme in the movie is ‘’deja-vu’’. Jack tells Wandy that he felt he came the hotel before. As we shall see later, he has a photography which dates back to 1921. But even more the dialouge between him and Mr Grady is a prof for this and pretty confusing. So does Jack live since the early 20th century ?

‘’Jack Torrance: You WERE the caretaker here, Mr. Grady. 
Delbert Grady: No sir, YOU are the caretaker. You've always been the caretaker. I ought to know: I've always been here.’’

Last but not least, another character that helps us analyse Jack is, Lloyd. He is another mirror figure. At the bar scene we see that Jack speaks with Lloyd, but actually he is talking himself,  however, is he also really talking himself at the red toilet room with Grady, too. So story is really supernatural.

Ultimately the movie, the characters and locations have some exotic and supernatural sides, all of which makes us feel uncanny and observe the dark psychologicial side of them.