The Shining
Stanley Kubrick ’s 1980 psychological horror filmThe Shininghas not aged well for a contemporary audience . Adapted from Stephen King ’s 1977 novel of the same name , the motion picture travel along the Torrance family at the hauntedOverlook Hotel . Starring Jack Nicholson and Shelley Duvall , it feature an raiment of problematic and triggering example of domestic violence and child abuse . While movies have the baron to highlight and examine authoritative issues such as these , Kubrick ’s film and characters brush them off as insignificant and allowable .
Jack Torrance ( Jack Nicholson ) is a writer who suffers with alcoholism . When he is offered a caretaker position at the Overlook Hotel for the wintertime , he climb up at the chance to seclude and focus on his writing . He occupy his married woman Wendy ( Shelley Duvall ) and son Danny with him . After a month , Jack ’s writing has not progressed at the pace he hoped for and the hard drink of the hotel convince him to set about drinking again . As a blizzard approaches The Overlook , Jack psychologically rag his kinsfolk and threaten their lives in various ways .
Related : The Shining ’s Original Ending Had Wendy KILL Jack
in the end , Danny and Wendy escape Jack and leave him to freeze to death in the hotel ’s hedge maze . The account of Danny Torrance keep on with the sequel , Doctor Sleep , and reveals a much more complex history of his biography at the hotel . Jack ’s ill-usage on Danny has follow him into adulthood . While it is not play up as much in the sequel , The Shiningdoes not shy away from establishing the fact that Jack Torrance abused his married woman and child . Due to the abusive nature of the character and Kubrick ’s own ill-usage of his mould , the film has not age well in the modern day .
The Shining’s Domestic Violence and Real-Life Abuse
In both the film and novel , Wendy ( Shelley Duvall ) discusses the maltreatment that Danny has experienced at the hands of his founder . While she addresses that it is an matter that Jack strike Danny , she does n’t treat it as important because , at that current mo , he hold on drinking and the violent behavior ceased . Furthermore , Wendy talk about the vilification she has experienced from him as well as what she continues to face as the film go on . The film does not address the subject affair well whatsoever , as the character brush off the abuse and continually make excuses for Jack ’s treatment of charwoman and his child .
Jack Torrancewas not the only abusive character on set . In recent old age , Kubrick has been divulge for use methods that purposefully tormented Shelley Duvall in parliamentary procedure to enhance the terror that her character would show . Duvall faced physical injury from the abuse she go through when the director would not allow her to take a intermission . The film made Duvall consider leaving the industriousness all together . Stephen Kinghas also regarded Kubrick ’s adaptation as grossly misogynous . moreover , King ’s novel does not depict Wendy as a fair sex who would put up with insult ; she in reality predicts the events before they pass , and protect her son . In the book , Wendy was initially a unassailable woman that Kubrick chose to tear down .
Ultimately , the misogynistic depiction of Wendy alongside the moving-picture show ’s issues of not address the job of domesticated fierceness and child abuse resultant role in a film that does not age well in the slightest . Furthermore , Stanley Kubrick’sown abusive methods towards Shelley Duvall and rank misinterpretation of the Wendy Torrance character put an additional level of problems that the film has . The Shininghas not age well , especially with the hike of # MeToo and the incessant fight for legislature to protect women and tike from violence .
More : Every Actor Who ’s Played The Shining ’s Jack Torrance
