favorite movie #88 - halloween edition: wolf

Favorite movies that have had an impact on me - #88 - Wolf (1994) - I've written about this film before, one of my favorite Jack Nicholson and werewolf movies:

I recently caught another film that Nicholson did with Pfieffer, Wolf (1994), and really liked it. Directed by Mike Nichols, it is a dark urban fairy tale and love story. Wolf at first seems a pretty standard werewolf update, and in some ways it is. Rick Baker (An American Werewolf in London) does the make-up effects, but this is not a movie that cares about showcasing the special effects of the werewolf transformation. It is about the after-effects of the transformation and its effects on the hero. 

Nicholson plays Will Randall, a New York editor-in-chief at a publishing house, who one night, while in Vermont, gets bitten by a wolf. Will soon starts to develop some enhanced abilities — smell, hearing, perception. And he sparks the interest of Laura Alden (Pfeiffer), a poor little rich girl with a huge chip on her shoulder — who also happens to be his boss's daughter. Will sums up Laura's privileged, bratty attitude when they first meet in some dialogue that was tailor-made for Nicholson to recite. Can you even imagine any other actor being able to not only say these lines convincingly, but intrigue a woman like Michelle Pfeiffer while saying them? 

"You know, I think I understand what you're like now. You're very beautiful and you think men are only interested in you because you're beautiful, but you want them to be interested in you because you're you. The problem is, aside from all that beauty, you're not very interesting. You're rude, you're hostile, you're sullen, you're withdrawn. I know you want someone to look past all that at the real person underneath, but the only reason anyone would bother to look past all that is because you're beautful. Ironic, isn't it? In an odd way you're your own problem."

You can read the entire review here.

favorite movie #87 - halloween edition: the shining

Favorite movies that have had an impact on me - #87 - The Shining (1980) - I didn't actually like this film much when it first came out, but it has really grown on me. Jack Nicholson's performance as Jack Torrance has become iconic. As much as I like Stephen King's original novel, this adaptation by Stanley Kubrick stands on its own as a brilliant, separate artwork. So many wonderful, symmetrical shots. Redrum!!!

Related:

the shining

room 237 — wheels within wheels

doctor sleep and the lure of the sequel

stephen king's on the night shift again

doctor sleep and the lure of the sequel

While I was reading Doctor Sleep I was bouncing back and forth between my memories of the novel, written by Stephen King in 1977, and the movie adaptation by director Stanley Kubrick, from 1980. I suspect King may have had both in his mind as well. Although it is well-documented that King didn't love the film version, Jack Nicholson's portrayal of Jack Torrance was indelible, as were Shelley Duvall as his wife Wendy and the Overlook Hotel itself. The sins of the father will play out in his gifted son.

The grown-up Dan Torrance, a recovering alcoholic, just like dear old dad, now uses his ability to "shine" to help the dying cross over peacefully. He is contrasted with a young girl named Abra, who may shine even more strongly than young Dan ever did. Complicating matters are a bunch of creepy supernatural folks who seem to thrive on the energy of young shiners. Uh oh.

All of the literary links and in-jokes  relating to The Shining aside, the central compelling story of Dan's link to Abra, and their desire to use and understand their abilities while staying human is what really works in Doctor Sleep. King has always got people, and how they talk and interact. The spooky stuff is actually the least interesting aspect of this novel.

room 237 — wheels within wheels

The documentary Room 237, dealing with possible hidden meanings in Stanley Kubrick's 1980 film The Shining is sure to be fun for conspiracy theorists and film buffs — at least, at first. But as the 102-minute movie runs on, viewers may get more and more impatient as each theory is proposed, one more outlandish than the next.

Much is made of the pattern of the carpet in the Overlook Hotel

Kubrick's stylistic and chilly adaptation of Stephen King's novel centers around writer Jack Torrance, a recovering alcoholic who agrees to take a job as the caretaker at the scenic but very isolated Overlook Hotel during the off-season. He moves there with his wife Wendy (Shelley Duvall) and young son Danny (Danny Lloyd). Danny can "shine" — he has psychic abilities, and can see ghosts and people and events from the past. As time passes Jack begins drinking again and gets more and more distant from his family and drawn closer and closer to the supernatural inhabitants of the hotel.

King couldn't even make it all the way through the documentary:

"Yeah. Well, let me put it this way – I watched about half of it and got sort of impatient with it and turned it off. ... These guys were reaching. I've never had much patience for academic bullshit. It's like Dylan says, 'You give people a lot of knives and forks, they've gotta cut something.' And that was what was going on in that movie."

There are quite a few different theories proposed, but the ones that seem to get the most airtime are:

• The genocide of Native Americans (supported supposedly by the Western-themed decorations in the Overlook Hotel, and shots of cans of Calumet Baking Powder, which feature the head of a Native American.
• That a travel poster may be referencing the myth of the Minotaur (although the skier in the poster doesn't even remotely resemble the half-man half-beast).
• That the film is about the Holocaust (Jack is using a German typewriter).
• That the film proves that the Apollo 11 moon landing was faked (Danny wears a sweater featuring the Apollo 11 rocket).

Can you spot the Calumet baking powder? But then what does the Sanka and Tang mean???

There is an interesting section towards the end of Room 237 that shows how similar some of the shots are in the film whether you run it forwards or backwards, with footage running the images together in both directions at the same time. That is the sort of thing that the biggest fans of Kubrick will love. Does it prove anything about The Shining? Not really, but it does point out how elegantly Kubrick framed his shots and mirrored his scenes.

the girl

Samantha Geimer, who in 1977 was the 13 year-old who was "the girl" in the infamous Roman Polanski sexual abuse case, has finally chosen to tell the whole, sordid story in her own words in The Girl: A Life in the Shadow of Roman Polanski. The book's title is more apt than might first be suspected. Geimer not only endured the events of that evening so many years ago, but has had her life inextricably, unfavorably linked with the famous director ever since.

In The Girl Geimer takes a mostly unblinking look at her life and Polanski's, and details, step-by-step, the events that led up to her being plied with champagne and part of a Quaalude, and eventually subject to multiple sex acts with Polanski against her will.

Samantha Geimer, at 13, photographed by Roman Polanski

Geimer's mom, an aspiring actress, moved her two young daughters to Los Angeles with her latest boyfriend, who got a job selling advertising for Marijuana Monthly magazine. Welcome to 1970s L.A. Mom didn't just want to secure acting jobs for herself, but encouraged both of her daughters to try out for parts too. One evening she met the director Roman Polanski at a party. He told her he was interested in photographing American girls for a Paris Vogue magazine spread. Excited, she invited him to meet Samantha. He came to their house and then took her on a drive to a nearby park, where they "rehearsed": he photographed her, first clothed, and then, with a little encouragement, topless.

Geimer is able to channel her teenage self, in all its insecurities, as well as attitude. She articulates very well her resistance and fear mixed with the ambition and misplaced starstruck hopes that this "little thing" of taking her top off might lead to a big career. She of course didn't tell her mother the little detail about taking off her shirt when she got back home. Geimer wants the reader to understand that at no time did she think there was anything sexual or untoward about the shoot with Polanski. And most importantly, that her mother had no idea, and would never have "pimped out" her daughter, an accusation that was hurled many times after the rape.

"You know, there's something about fame. There just is. I mean, think about the kids who had sleepovers at Michael Jackson's house and all the accusations that followed. Think about their parents. Were they bad or stupid people? No. They just wanted to believe that being famous made you good."

Polanski came back a second time, a few weeks later, and suggested that he was ready now to do the shoot for real. Again her mother didn't accompany them, as Polanski told her that it might make her daughter nervous, less natural. He took Geimer first to the home of actress Jacqueline Bisset, where she was offered some wine (she declined). They took a few photos and then he took her to another friend's house – the actor Jack Nicholson, who was away from home at the time. Polanski started plying her with champagne, which now she didn't refuse. He also gave her part of a Quaalude and photographed her in the kitchen.

"He asked me if I knew what it [the Quaalude] was. I didn't want to seem like a stupid kid, so I said, 'Sure.'"

Polanski then suggested she take off her clothes and get in the jacuzzi for more photographs, where he joined her. He soon moved her to the bedroom, where he proceeded to have sex with her. Geimer transmits her failing resistance as the drugs and alcohol and general atmosphere took effect. She details the sex acts, and later, the pounding on the bedroom door which helped end things – Nicholson's girlfriend, Angelica Huston, came home early. It's a sordid, upsetting read.

At Jack Nicolson's house

And then things really got ugly. That same evening, after he took her home, Polanski showed her mother photos from the first shoot, which included some of the topless photos. Shocked, she asked him to leave. Geimer's sister quickly discovered the truth and helped her mother put two and two together. The police were called and the nightmare really began. Geimer's life became a cycle of making depositions and trying to stay out of the picture as Polanski was arrested and Hollywood and the public began to take sides. Her family and lawyer tried to keep her identity secret for as long as they could. But as the story was reported (and reported and reported ad nauseum) it seemed that as many thought "the girl" was a slut or an opportunist as an innocent child. Geimer knew she had been used and abused by Polanski, but she was also angry at her mother for bringing the whole embarrassing episode into the public eye.

Geimer never apologizes for Polanski, but over the years she has had a lot of time to consider his behavior. She proclaims she is no fan of his films – Chinatown bored her – but she writes feelingly about his youth, and persecution as a Polish Jew during WWII, and his escape from the Kraków Ghetto. How he watched his parents being taken away to concentration camps. His mother was killed in Auschwitz. His father survived Mauthausen, but they were never as close after he finally came home. He attended film school and eventually began to have success as a director. He life seemed to have finally come together when he met and married the actress Sharon Tate, who he met on the set of his film The Fearless Vampire Killers. But a year after they were married, she was brutally murdered by The Manson Family. She was eight months pregnant at the time.

Throughout the book she tries to frame the events of her life, and especially that evening, in the context of the times. She is very aware that Hollywood, especially in those days, had a taste for nymphets – with Brooke Shields in Pretty Baby (1978), Jodie Foster in Taxi Driver (1976) and Foxes (1980), and Tatum O'Neal in Little Darlings (1980).

"In the 1970s ... There was something considered generally positive about erotic experience then, even in the absence of anything beyond the sex itself. The idea was that emotional growth came about through an expanded sexuality – for both the person in power and the relatively powerless. This is important to consider, because this is the cultural paradigm Roman Polanski was sopping up in 1977. As wrong as he was to do what he did, I know beyond a doubt that he didn't look at me as one of his victims. Not everyone will understand this, but I never thought he wanted to hurt me; he wanted me to enjoy it. He was arrogant and horny. But I feel certain he was not looking to take pleasure in my pain."

Geimer and her family accepted a plea bargain from Polanski's lawyers to keep her name out of the public record, and most importantly, the papers. But the judge on the case, Judge Laurence J. Rittenband, seemed more interested in the reflected limelight than justice for either party, and he reneged on his original decision of probation for Polanski (after he had already served 42 days in jail) to additional potential incarceration, of up to 50 years. Not surprisingly, Polanski booked the first flight out, and sought refuge in Europe, staying in countries like France, where he could not be extradited to the U.S. And he has been exiled ever since.

But Geimer's life didn't settle down once Polanski was out of the picture. Every time his name might come up in the news – whether for a new film being released, or an attempt to reopen the case, she and her family would be hounded by the press. She writes unflinchingly of her teen pregnancy, drug use, and drifting aimlessly for a number of years through life, from one crisis to the next. She is not one for regrets, but admits that undeniably her life would have been different if she hadn't taken that ride in the car with Polanski to Nicholson's house.

The Girl is a fast and compelling read, but it doesn't provide any easy answers. The case, even after all these years, is far from closed. Geimer points out that Polanski the artist, the director of such classic films as Rosemary's Baby, Chinatown, and The Pianist, should be viewed separately from the horny man with a taste for young girls. Many people are able and willing to do that, but there are just as many who aren't. Geimer, who was the victim of a rape, of sex against her will, would also hope that she would not be viewed forever as a victim. She doesn't consider herself one. She comes across beleaguered at times, but always strong.

Samantha Geimer is married, with three sons, and splits her life between Hawaii and Nevada. For better or worse, Geimer's and Polanski's lives, from that evening in March 1977 forward, were forever linked. She acknowledges that Polanski has been just as much a prisoner, as pursued relentlessly by the media and misused by the U.S. criminal justice system, as she has. Strangers but not strangers, they seem to have settled their differences and found some sort of peace with one another. She may not ever be able to completely leave that night with Polanski behind her, but she has finally had the chance to tell her story, unfiltered.

favorite song friday

Following up yesterday's post about Carly Simon, I couldn't resist checking out this song. After all these years, it still holds up. As does its mystery man (or men). Never tell, Carly.


Of course I can't resist adding my guess. I think that the subject of the song is a composite, but that the spur for writing such a song was most likely Warren Beatty, who Carly briefly dated, and then was reportedly passed along from him to some of his Hollywood pals, including Jack Nicholson. We'll never know, and we shouldn't, because isn't the imaging and wondering part of the fun of the song? It also lets that mysterious man with the apricot scarf and curious taste in antiques dances (Gavotte!) remain a legend and not a reality.

a new cast of characters

My mom has settled in to her new life at the nursing home — but have I? I have to admit that I still find her living in this group situation a little unnerving. I know that I don't have the patience, knowledge, or facilities that she now requires to care for her at home. She's in the right place.

Image from the nursing home's facebook page

As we go to visit her and I see her react and interact with some of the other residents I am of two minds. Sometimes it is fun to see her "chat" with another person, a shade of her old "ladies who lunch" days. It doesn't seem to matter that what they may say to one another is fairly unintelligible. But there are other residents in the common room who don't always interact in the most positive manner. It's not exactly "cuckoo's nest" territory, but the movie and Jack Nicholson flit through my mind in regard to a few of the more difficult folks. And being me, I can't help but start to assign nicknames to everyone:

Dangerous (or Dastardly, or Dubious, insert appropriate D-word here) David - He is fond of using swear words and other guttural noises, and seems to have been (thankfully) banned from the dining room. He is a negative presence and we try to steer as clear of him as possible.

Miss Sugar - She reminds me of Aunt Esther from Sanford & Son and insists on adding four Sweet and Low packets to her soup (and just about everything else she eats).

Miss Itchy Scratchy - She has blue-painted nails and is constantly fluttering them and adjusting her pants legs, in constant motion, like a hummingbird.

The Stroller - She usually has a sour puss, but she and mom seem to have become friends. They sit together and look out the window at the gorgeous view (the nursing home is right across the street from the Intracoastal) and Ms. Stroller pokes mom playfully (mostly) and then points to something she wants her to see outside. It's sort of aggressive attention, yet friendly. Weird. But it reminds me of playground behavior, which I guess we never really can escape.

There are many more folks who are part of the regular cast of characters on the third floor. But what makes this whole transition a little easier on me is that my mom seems to be happy to be there. Dangerous David bugs her (and everyone else), but she loves all the nurses and attendants and seems to enjoy the many people-watching opportunities. For me, it's hard not to watch everyone and wonder who they used to be. Maybe I'll get glimpses, I just have to pay attention.

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jack nicholson in wolf

Jack Nicholson is revered as one of our greatest, if quirkiest, actors. From his brilliant work in Stanley Kubrick's The Shining to his earlier turns in Five Easy Pieces (1970), Chinatown (1974) and One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975) it is undeniable that Jack can be riveting to watch on screen. But I have to admit that for me, he has always been a bit of an acquired taste.

Kubrick was able to harness the innate anger that he brings to every role in a really interesting, and ultimately terrifying way in The Shining, but Nicholson's trademark eyebrow-lifting sarcasm wears on me, probably because I grew up with an angry dad and have my own issues with expressing anger. When I first saw As Good As It Gets (1997) I loathed it and all of the characters (except probably Greg Kinnear and the dog.) Admittedly that was as much the sitcom-my script as Jack's OCD performance. I enjoyed him in The Witches of Eastwick (1987), another movie where his infectious personality and fractious anger was well-suited to the eccentric material. His devilish interactions with the three witches, Cher, Susan Sarandon, and Michelle Pfieffer, were just the right mixture of creepy and sexy.

I recently caught another film that Nicholson did with Pfieffer, Wolf (1994), and really liked it. Directed by Mike Nichols, it is a dark urban fairy tale and love story. Wolf at first seems a pretty standard werewolf update, and in some ways it is. Rick Baker (An American Werewolf in London) does the make-up effects, but this is not a movie that cares about showcasing the special effects of the werewolf transformation. It is about the after-effects of the transformation and its effects on the hero.

Nicholson plays Will Randall, a New York editor-in-chief at a publishing house, who one night, while in Vermont, gets bitten by a wolf. Will soon starts to develop some enhanced abilities — smell, hearing, perception. And he sparks the interest of Laura Alden (Pfeiffer), a poor little rich girl with a huge chip on her shoulder — who also happens to be his boss's daughter. Will sums up Laura's privileged, bratty attitude when they first meet in some dialogue that was tailor-made for Nicholson to recite. Can you even imagine any other actor being able to not only say these lines convincingly, but intrigue a woman like Michelle Pfeiffer while saying them?

"You know, I think I understand what you're like now. You're very beautiful and you think men are only interested in you because you're beautiful, but you want them to be interested in you because you're you. The problem is, aside from all that beauty, you're not very interesting. You're rude, you're hostile, you're sullen, you're withdrawn. I know you want someone to look past all that at the real person underneath, but the only reason anyone would bother to look past all that is because you're beautful. Ironic, isn't it? In an odd way you're your own problem."

Nicholson is the perfect actor for this modern werewolf retelling, and the film is so much better than the terrible The Wolfman that poor Benicio Del Toro was stuck in a few years back. Nicholson is never afraid to to go a little big, a little crazy, which is well-suited to a man slowly losing control — maybe for the first time in his life — and liking it. His chemistry with Pfieffer is palpable, and the viewer can't help but root for their dangerous, doomed romance. The entire cast is first-rate, with Kate Nelligan as Nicholson's distant wife and Christopher Plummer as Pfieffer's tycoon father. Rounding out the cast, in one of the smarmiest of his trademark smarmy turns, is James Spader, as Stewart Swinton, Will's ambitious, treacherous protege.

Will, "You are such a polished ass kisser that it takes my breath away."
Stewart, "I kiss 'em like I see 'em."

Wolf is a werewolf movie, but at its core it is more interested in the modern jungle of New York and the cut-throat dealings that Will experiences at the office and on the homefront on a daily basis. So many of the characters — Will, Laura, Stewart, are solitary figures, trying to make their way in a harsh world, like the lone wolf that originally bites Will. Will's newfound wolf-like behavior may even be a boon in the publishing world. One of the best scenes in the movie involves a confrontation between Will and Stewart in their company's men's room, where Will "marks his territory" by pissing on Stewart's suede shoes. I really love Nicholson in Wolf, from his restrained, even nebbish beginnings to his all-out animal ending. His wolfish encounter ends up being more of a blessing than a curse.

it's hard getting old — about schmidt and everybody's fine

I recently watched two very similarly-themed movies that feature older, recently widowed men and their tenuous attachments to their families, About Schmidt and Everybody's Fine. Both feature great actors getting to play something very rare in Hollywood movies — their age.

In About Schmidt, from 2002, Jack Nicholson is wonderful as Warren Schmidt, a man who has kept life at a distance. As the movie opens he is retiring from a job as an insurance actuary. The opening shots of Omaha's Woodmen of the World building, where Schmidt worked, are fantastic and set the tone for this "life viewed from a distance" film. Schmidt himself has lived most of his life at a distance, void of emotion.  He may or may not have liked his job, but he has certainly spent most of his time involved with it rather than his wife and daughter. A few days into his retirement he is already bored and resenting all of his wife's routines and tics. But almost as soon as he starts to catalogue her faults, she dies, suddenly. His daughter Jeannie, played by Hope Davis, comes for the funeral, but she clearly doesn't care much for him and can't wait to get back to her life in Denver and planning her upcoming wedding.

Awkward airport goodbyes, L-R: Dermot Mulroney, Hope Davis and Jack Nicholson

Schmidt isn't sure what it's all about anymore.

Schmidt, "I know we're all pretty small in the big scheme of things, and I suppose the most you can hope for is to make some kind of difference, but what kind of difference have I made? What in the world is better because of me?"

Schmidt decides to sponsor a child from Tanzania, Ndugu, and the film includes voiceover narration of his informative and inappropriate letters to the young boy. As he tells Ndugu, Schmidt strongly disapproves of Jeannie's fiance, waterbed salesman Randall (Dermot Mulroney). But she won't listen  to him and has no desire to come home to Omaha and take care of him. Scenes of Schmidt rambling around his house and life after his wife has died couldn't help but remind me of my dad after my parents' divorce. Whether he was happy in his marriage or not, Schmidt clearly feels rudderless without his wife around.

Kathy Bates is hysterical as Randall's randy mom, Roberta.

In the hot tub with Kathy Bates

Roberta, "You already know how famously they get along as friends, but did you know that their sex life is positively white hot? The main reason both of my marriages failed was sexual. I'm an extremely sexual person, I can't help it, it just how I'm wired, you know, even when I was a little girl. I had my first orgasm when I was six in ballet class. Anyway, the point is that I have been always very easily aroused and very orgasmic, Jeannie and I have a lot in common that way. Clifford and Larry, they were nice guys, but they just could not keep up with me. Anyway, I don't want to betray Jeannie's confidence, but let me just assure you that whatever problems those two kids may run into along the way, they will always be able to count on what happens between the sheets to keep them together. More soup?" 

Schmidt, "Eh... no, I think I'm fine now."

And Nicholson is fine as Schmidt. The camera spends a lot of time on his face, and we get to suffer along with him as he travels the open road, trying to connect with his daughter, with life.

Robert De Niro takes a road trip to visit his kids

Robert De Niro plays a similar character, Frank Goode, in Everybody's Fine, which came out in 2009. It's a remake of an Italian film, Giuseppe Tornatore's Stanno Tutti Bene, which I haven't seen. Frank has four children, and none of them want to visit him after their mother dies. One by one, he tries to pay each a visit, some interactions more successful than others. Frank realizes that his kids were able to tell his wife anything, and that now it is easier for them to lie to him. Three of the grown kids, Robert (Sam Rockwell), Rosie (Drew Barrymore), and Amy (Kate Beckinsale) are equal parts suspicious of his motives and grief-stricken. Each has some substantial issues or secrets to work out with their father, but they aren't as disconnected from Frank as Schmidt's daughter Jeannie is in About Schmidt.

Rosie, "We could just talk to mom."
Frank, "Oh, but you couldn't just talk to me?"
Rosie, "Well she was a good listener, you were a good talker."
Frank, "Well so that's good, we made a good team."

De Niro and Drew Barrymore

Everybody's Fine doesn't strike as deep a chord as About Schmidt does, but it is still a nice little film. There is some added drama, as De Niro's Frank has a heart condition and spends most of the movie without some of his necessary medicine, but viewers only have to look to the title to be reassured of the outcome.

As much as aging is depicted as difficult — it's always hard to be on the other side of youth and promise — both men in these films are doing the best they can and are trying to live their lives with dignity. Both films are ultimately uplifting, and definitely worth a look.

the shining

"The whole place was empty. But it wasn't really empty. Because here in the Overlook things just went on and on. Here in the Overlook all times were one. ... It was as if the whole place had been wound up with a silver key. The clock was running. The clock was running. He was that key, Danny thought sadly."

In Stephen King's The Shining Jack Torrance is a man with many issues. He is a recovering alcoholic who battles his desire to drink every day. He has a temper and is prone to flying off the handle at anyone who challenges his sense of personal worth or authority. He recently lost his teaching position after getting in a physical altercation with a student. He is an aspiring writer with a play he can't seem to quite finish. His wife Wendy hasn't trusted him since he broke their son Danny's arm in a drunken rage. He is practically unemployable, and their savings are just about nil. In a last-ditch attempt to try to finish his play and salvage his relationship with his wife and son he accepts a job at the Overlook Hotel in Colorado, as the caretaker during the winter season when the hotel is closed to guests and visitors. Very bad idea.

Jack Nicholson gave an unforgettable performance as Jack in Stanley Kubrick's film The Shining

Jack's son Danny isn't a typical five year-old. He sees things — both from the past and the future. He can read minds, and speak to others who share his ability, who "shine," as the Overlook's chef, Dick Hallorann, calls it. But as a child, Danny is essentially powerless. He has to go to the Overlook, a place he knows to be dangerous, because his parents say so. But he is also the most powerful person in the novel because of his ability to shine. His parents may close their eyes to his abilities, but the entity that is the Overlook is very aware of Danny's power and desperately wants to control him. Hallorann, who shares the ability to shine, although to a lesser degree, is Danny's only true ally, as his parents work out their marital issues and the hotel takes more and more control of their lives.

Even if Danny didn't shine, all signs point to the fact that Jack should not take the job — or if he does, he at least shouldn't take his family there with him for the winter. As Stuart Ullman, the manager of the hotel, tells Jack at his job interview, "During our first winter I hired a family instead of a single man. There was tragedy. A horrible tragedy."

King brings many shades to what at first seems a simple haunted house tale. The supernatural forces at work, and Danny's (and maybe the rest of his family's) ability to see them. How alcoholism affects a person, his ability to create, and his family. A close-up look at the dissolution of a marriage. The difficulties of parenting.

Jack has a tendency towards violence, whether drunk or sober. He thinks he knows better than everyone ("Father knows best") and is constantly excusing himself, his judgments, his jealousies. The reader learns that his father was abusive, to the point of almost killing his mother, which helps fill in some of Jack's blanks, but King never excuses any of his behavior. If the Overlook was holding a casting call, it couldn't have picked anyone more suited for the job of caretaker-gone-mad than Jack. King writes about Jack's ability to connect with both the hero and villain in his play. The reader can connect with all of the characters in The Shining. Jack, when he is in his craziest most dangerous moments, is to some degree sympathetic. He also has a wicked sense of humor, “The boiler’s okay and I haven’t even gotten around to murdering my wife yet. I’m saving that until after the holidays, when things get dull.”

The Overlook was based on the Stanley Hotel

It is well-known that King himself was an alcoholic (and was at the time of writing The Shining). One can't help but feel that his love/hate for the character of Jack Torrance is his own beating up of himself and his demons. Parenting is hard and there are times, no matter how much you love your child, that they drive you nuts and make you angry. This is taken to extremes in Jack's story, but one of his defining moments is when he broke Danny's arm. This violent act haunts Jack as much as any of the other creepy things that inhabit the Overlook. King keeps Jack's feelings ambiguous. Was evil always inherent in Jack, and the Overlook able to hone it, bring it out? Or is alcohol mostly responsible for his violent tendencies? Is the Overlook King's metaphor for alcoholism? Are the ghosts Jack's alcoholic demons made real? The Shining can incorporate all of these elements and still just be a darn good ghost story.

King switches back and forth between the viewpoints of his main characters, which can sometimes be dizzying, but also adds to the claustrophobic nature of the Torrances and their life at the Overlook. Jack and his family seem trapped long before they ever get to the hotel. What at first simply appears to be cabin fever gradually reveals itself as the hotel's mounting campaign to ensnare its latest residents. I've always thought of the Eagles' song Hotel California in tandem with The Shining (which, coincidentally, came out in the same year as the novel — 1977), "You can check out anytime you like, but you can never leave." The Overlook and its axis of evil always seems to be looking for new blood.

Wendy in the novel is far from the doormat wife that is depicted in the film version. Although she knows in her heart that her marriage has been dead for quite some time, she is still unwilling to let go, to leave Jack. Because of the family's dire financial circumstances, the Torrances all feel dependent on this job. She may still feel some enduring love for her husband, but she is hesitant to separate Danny from Jack, from the very strong bond she knows that father and son share.

The Shining drags a bit, is too long. I think if it was tighter, it would have been even scarier. But there is no denying that there are some genuinely frightening sequences. I was kicking myself at one point for reading it late at night. When Stephen King wants to scare you, you get properly scared: Danny in a sinister snow-covered playground. Jack and Wendy's confrontation in the lobby and chase up the stairs. Danny discovering what really lies behind the door of Room 217. The wasp's nest. The Overlook is one of the most interesting characters in the novel. But I would have liked a little more of the why and not the what of its evil history.

When King is writing from Danny's point of a view the language at times is far too elaborate. A five year-old, even a psychic one who shines would not be so adult in his perceptions or conclusions. There are inappropriate sequences, too. The hotel (and author) expose Danny to sexual imagery for no really good reason except to shock. There is also lots of use of negative, racist slurs in relation to the African American character of Hallorann, which instead of portraying certain characters as racist, just gives a racist cast to parts of the book. It was King's third novel. It's not perfect, but it is indeed, in parts, quite chilling.

Book vs film:

There are so many things in Kubrick's adaptation of The Shining that I like. The tightening-up of the story, the ominous and influential use of Steadicam. "Redrum" is more skillfully handled than it was in the book, where it became a bit repetitive and clunky (and obvious).  

But Kubrick sacrifices a lot of what I like about King's novel — Jack's wavering back and forth between his love for his family and the violent path the hotel wants him to follow. He believes he can change, can be a better man, can succeed. In the film, once Jack (Jack Nicholson) starts going down the path to madness it's a one-way street with no looking back.  

King creates some frightening imagery with the menacing topiary animals, but they appear too often, so for me, the scares became diluted. Kubrick's changing of the topiary animals to a hedge maze was an improvement. The scene where Danny tries to hide in the maze, stepping backwards in his footsteps in the snow in order to elude his pursuer, is one of the greatest moments in horror film.

The chase through the maze is unforgettable. 

Kubrick completely screws up the character of Hallorann and subjects him to a very unnecessary and cheap shot at the end of the film, which is most definitely not in the book. 

I missed the creepy Grady girls in the book, as they were so visually powerful in the film, and have become indelibly connected to The Shining.

Could the Torrances have escaped their fates? Is The Shining really about human weakness? Anyone who spent the winter or any extended time at the Overlook Hotel would be exposed to its ghostly, evil atmosphere. But why do the Torrances all feel like they can't leave? Jack wrestles back and forth with wanting to be there, become part of its history, to wanting to leave, to protect his family. Wendy feels trapped in her relationship with Jack because she has no other safe harbor (she is estranged from her only other living relative, her mother). Danny loves his daddy so much that he doesn't want to leave him, even when he has seen what is coming, who will come after him.

Stephen King is reportedly writing a sequel, Dr. Sleep, with a 40 year-old Danny using his abilities to help terminally ill patients cross over. And then he runs into some psychic vampires ... It is likely that someone like Danny, if he caught the attention of the malevolent forces at the Overlook would run across something like that again. The Shining dealt with a lot of the issues that King was battling at the time. Both he and Danny are older now. It will be interesting to see what happens next and if he finds himself in another environment like the Overlook.

catching up with ... how do you know

This should have been a good movie, but it's not. It's not bad because the main actors — Reese Witherspoon, Owen Wilson and Paul Rudd —lack appeal. They are all fine. The script has some funny moments and even Jack Nicholson is giving it his all. Witherspoon plays a character that is trying to sort out her life, professional and private. For a female character to do that in a movie, and to actually be the focus of the movie, is a rare and good thing. So what exactly is wrong with How Do You Know?

It starts with an original premise — Witherspoon's character is a female jock (softball) who has just been cut from her team and is having a lot of trouble trying to figure out not only what to do next, but who exactly she is. Unfortunately, the film soon introduces the love triangle, and her character seems to completely forget her dilemma. Even though I just watched the movie, I have no idea what her character's name was, or any of the characters. That's not good.

There is a completely uninteresting, unbelievable, and almost unintelligible subplot involving Rudd and his dad, played by Nicholson, involving corporate scandal. Maybe Brooks just wanted to include his old buddy Nicholson in the film? How Do You Know at least is less crass than As Good As it Gets, another James L. Brooks film that starred Nicholson (which I really couldn't stand.)

The either/or proposition that Witherspoon faces is beyond predictable. Before the movie starts we know that Paul Rudd is going to be the one she ends up with. Rudd, who is one of the most charming actors out there, in this movie plays a total shlump. He's a nice guy, but not a nice guy a girl would want to spend too much time with. He is so cringeworthy so much of the time that it is highly unlikely that he and Witherspoon would end up together. I was actually hoping against hope that she would walk off into the sunset by herself, and start dealing with that question of what she was going to do with the rest pf her life post-softball career, which would be far more realistic than ending up with Rudd. I feel like a traitor to my Rudd crush writing this, but he was just icky. Maybe Brooks caved from the original ending, because that's how Rudd played his character throughout the movie.

Owen Wilson, who may have been playing far from the "perfect" guy (as if there is such a guy or girl), was his usual charming self, with a good dose of me-centric professional athlete thrown in. He was perfect in the role. Maybe he wasn't someone Witherspoon would decide to be with forever, but the guy deserved points for trying. Neither Rudd nor the script ever really gave a great reason why she shouldn't at least attempt to give her relationship with Wilson a chance.

The best scene in the movie was when Rudd asked Witherspoon, who he has a crush on but really hardly knows, to tag along with him and visit a female friend who has just given birth. Talk about being clueless about boundaries. But the script says she should go with him, so she does. They witness an exhibition of "true love" in his friend's hospital room and an extreme example of Rudd's character's usual cluelessness (which is actually the movie's funniest moment). Rudd then thinks he's finally broken through, gotten Witherspoon where he wants her, and she, as usual, just doesn't think of him that way at all. It's a real, human moment. But the movie then falls back into cliché rom-com territory and forces the two of them together anyway.

Either Owen Wilson's or Reese Witherspoon's characters got a raw deal, because their dialogue together was far more fun and full of potential than anything she shared with Rudd:

Witherspoon: What am I doing? I caught myself. Don't judge anybody else until you check yourself out, that way you are lucky if it's your fault because then you can correct the situation. I'm nervous over something that is going on with me, and I ended up with an attractive guy who you would have to be an idiot to mistake for anything more than just a fun friendship, and... and, yes amazing sex, and then I give that guy a hard time for just being who he is. Totally my fault, I'm sorry. Please forgive me.

Wilson: Are you apologizing? 

Witherspoon: Yeah. 

Wilson: If you are really apologizing, you may be my dream girl. I heard those footsteps and I'm like, right, somebody nuts is coming back to be more nuts, and now an apology. You might be my dream girl.

As far as I can tell, by movie's end, Witherspoon still doesn't know.