Product Description

?Heeeeere?s Johnny!? In a macabre masterpiece adapted from Stephen King?s novel, Jack Nicholson falls prey to forces haunting a snowbound mountain resort with a macabre history.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #12698 in DVD
• Released on: 2007-10-23
• Rating: R (Restricted)
• Aspect ratio: 1.85:1
• Formats: AC-3, Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, Dubbed, Special Edition, Subtitled, Widescreen
• Original language: English
• Subtitled in: English, French, Spanish
• Dubbed in: French, Spanish
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 144 minutes

Amazon.com essential video
Stanley Kubrick's The Shining is less an adaptation of Stephen King's bestselling horror novel than a complete reimagining of it from the inside out. In King's book, the Overlook Hotel is a haunted place that takes possession of its off-season caretaker and provokes him to murderous rage against his wife and young son. Kubrick's movie is an existential Road Runner cartoon (his steadicam scurrying through the hotel's labyrinthine hallways), in which the cavernously empty spaces inside the Overlook mirror the emptiness in the soul of the blocked writer, who's settled in for a long winter's hibernation. As many have pointed out, King's protagonist goes mad, but Kubrick's Jack Torrance (Jack Nicholson) is Looney Tunes from the moment we meet him--all arching eyebrows and mischievous grin. (Both Nicholson and Shelley Duvall reach new levels of hysteria in their performances, driven to extremes by the director's fanatical demands for take after take after take.) The Shining is terrifying--but not in the way fans of the novel might expect. When it was redone as a TV miniseries (reportedly because of King's dissatisfaction with the Kubrick film), the famous topiary-animal attack (which was deemed impossible to film in 1980) was there--but the deeper horror was lost. Kubrick's The Shining gets under your skin and chills your bones; it stays with you, inhabits you, haunts you. And there's no place to hide... --Jim Emerson

Amazon.com
Stanley Kubrick's The Shining is less an adaptation of Stephen King's bestselling horror novel than a complete reimagining of it from the inside out. In King's book, the Overlook Hotel is a haunted place that takes possession of its off-season caretaker and provokes him to murderous rage against his wife and young son. Kubrick's movie is an existential Road Runner cartoon (his steadicam scurrying through the hotel's labyrinthine hallways), in which the cavernously empty spaces inside the Overlook mirror the emptiness in the soul of the blocked writer, who's settled in for a long winter's hibernation. As many have pointed out, King's protagonist goes mad, but Kubrick's Jack Torrance (Jack Nicholson) is Looney Tunes from the moment we meet him--all arching eyebrows and mischievous grin. (Both Nicholson and Shelley Duvall reach new levels of hysteria in their performances, driven to extremes by the director's fanatical demands for take after take after take.) The Shining is terrifying--but not in the way fans of the novel might expect. When it was redone as a TV miniseries (reportedly because of King's dissatisfaction with the Kubrick film), the famous topiary-animal attack (which was deemed impossible to film in 1980) was there--but the deeper horror was lost. Kubrick's The Shining gets under your skin and chills your bones; it stays with you, inhabits you, haunts you. And there's no place to hide... --Jim Emerson

Customer Reviews

This shine needs some polish
Yes Kubrick was a great director but this was a mess of a miss. Read the book and see why all the real horror did not make it to the screen. The movie had way too much lighting in it to be scary as well. When I saw this in the theatres everyone booed the anti-climactic end. Kubrick never learned how to make a great horror film. Jack Nicholson over-acting all over the place does not make a great film. If there was ever a reason for Hollywood to re-make a horror film ah la The Omen.....well lets go-Im waiting. Just not Tom Cruise. Boooo!!!!!

Jack Nicholson rules!!
Ok, this is the real deal. I have never seen a better horror performance since this movie. Jack Nicholson creates a very spooky enviroment around the creepy hotel in the middle of nowhere. The extra content is pretty cool too. Two thumbs up! You cant get any better than this in the genre.

Why Nicholson is the face of horror
It might be hard to tell if he's really acting or just being himself. Jack Torrance. . .aka Jack Nicholson, the winter caretaker for the Overlook Hotel, descends into madness as he succumbs to the psychic presences in the hotel - and it's a delightful transformation! Stephen King's novel is closely followed, despite a few glaring omissions that might even have pushed Jack's character too far off the deep end to be tolerable. An eerie and inspiring film for any dark night!