@@tauruschorus the racism theme is more impactful in the USA because it’s so accepted in Europe. Probably why he erased this display of authority from Halloran in the European version.
Hi there! I come from the completely opposite side on this as someone who view the international cut to be a masterpiece and the US theatrical version not even reaching 5☆ out of 5☆. The key to this is the motto: Show - Don't tell!. Everything cut from the longer version are either A) unnecessary and overexplanatory exposition or B) scenes that remove tension. Notice what is being cut: Interactions with the outside world. TV watching. Dialog between people outside the hotel. By removing these bits is to remove our reference point to a normal life. It is to remove a feeling of comfort. It is to create a deeper feeling of isolation and dread. The exposition removes doubt and ambiguity. It makes thing make sense. Once again it provides us with comfort. A lot of the removed scenes are of the type Show AND Tell. "I am going to get my fire engine!" Danny says before going to get his fire engine. This is the way children tell stories. They tell us what is going to happen and then we see it acted out. It's a very vulgar form of moviemaking and it's not elegant. Kubrick knew this but was probably pushed by the producer to make the film more understandable. He later defended his cuts stating that the European audience were more used to ambiguity while the American audience demanded clarity. You said at one point it would make more sense to keep the dialog and remove the travelling bits. But it's very much the opposite. The long travel scenes and silent images of oversnowed roads and traffic accidents gives us a feeling of unease (did the passengers survive?) and it makes the hotel feel so isolated and far away. The dialog on the other hand doesn't give us much of use. It just lightens the mood to finally see scenes from a gas station and a living and breathing world out there. Then there are the scenes that just didn't work. The scene where Tony takes over Danny's body is so blatantly inspired by the massively successful The Exorcist. That scene makes Kubrick look like less of an auteur and more of a copycat. My guess is that Kubrick felt embarrassed when he saw it in the cinema. And then the derpy looking skeletons. They just looked like some cheap haunted house props and only served to remove ambiguity as it strengthens us in our conviction that something supernatural actually is going on. Then there is the pacing. When I hear people complain that Jack gets crazy too fast, that objection always seem to come from viewers of the US cut. Because his transformation really is jarring after the lenghty introduction with the doctor etc. But in the quicker pace of the international cut it doesn't seem so out of place. We see this as part of the premise. Something that we know almost from the start. You also pointed out that many cuts were so short that they hardly made a difference. But they do. All together all those removed seconds and half seconds makes the film flow better and makes the film a much leaner experience. The US cut drags. It becomes boring. Add the exposition and we get bored by the images. Without the exposition we search every corner of the frame to try to piece things together ourselves. And this is how a film like this should work. It should activate the viewer to fill in the blanks and find their own interpretations.
Fair enough counterpoint although I personally disagree. There's nothing that shows OR tells the audience in the first half of the international cut that Jack is an alcoholic or hurt Danny in the past. And if the cut removed that all together, it'd be one thing, but it still includes it in the Lloyd bar scene, but that's over an hour into the film. That's way too poorly paced of a revelation. In this case, Kubrick neither showed NOR told us that in the first half. Also, just my personal opinion, but the scene with Wendy and the doctor is among the best scenes of the movie. It perfectly shows, not tells, that Wendy is in complete fear and awe of Jack, despite her dialogue saying literally the exact opposite. The rest of the cuts I can take or leave (he was 100% right to cut those fucking awful skeletons!) but the doctor scene is absolutely needed.
@ericjohnson9623 Well, I disagree obviously. This is exactly the kind of exposition that was dead weight. To leave the revelation to the bar scene is perfect. It's just enough information and the fact that it comes from an unreliable narrator (the perpetrator himself) ensures that the explanation still stays open for interpretation. I think ambiguity is the difference between mainstream cinema and art house cinema. The US Theatrical cut is a much more of a mainstream movie while the international cut sits comfortably in the art house section. But there is a reason why art house movies doesn't enjoy huge commercial success and that's because it is making a big part of the audience uncomfortable. It's understandable that not everyone likes the international cut for that reason. But I think it's a damned shame that it is now almost fading away from distribution without getting the 4K treatment.
The scene near the end when Wendy sees the lobby full of cobwebbed skeletons was a visual 'echo' of a scene near the end of the movie "THE RULING CLASS" starring Peter O'Toole, the story of a madcap aristocrat -- the son of an English earl who dies from what appears to be autoerotic asphyxiation -- whose family stages an 'intervention' to disabuse him of the delusion that he's Jesus Christ . . . which tragically results in him adopting the scarier delusion that he's actually Jack the Ripper. At the end of the film, he's being invested with the title of Earl, taking over his late-father's hereditary rank among the Ruling Class . . . and the scene at Parliament becomes darkly psychedelic, with the other M.P.s appearing as cobwebbed skeletons (this imagery being what Kubrick was 'echoing' in THE SHiNiNG), with Peter O'Toole's 'Jack' character then -- SPOILER ALERT!!! -- murdering his own wife. One might argue that Wendy Torrance had seen that Peter O'Toole movie and -- when the craziness becomes apparent to her in the wake of Hallorann's murder, that bloodshed suddenly attuning her to the presence of the Supernatural in that haunted hotel -- her own memory of seeing that movie's ending, of a wife character being murdered by a husband named 'Jack', causes her to 'see' that movie's imagery coming to life there, in that lobby of the Overlook Hotel. Thematically, the Overlook represents the ground zero of American political power -- a counterpart to the British Parliament chambers -- built upon the genocidal violence perpetrated against the Natives, where all "the best people" go during its open season, from May the 1st until the end of October (i.e. Halloween), where 4 Presidents had stayed, etc. More fans of Kubrick's movie need to know about -- and actually see -- that earlier film, "THE RULING CLASS." It starts off as a zany comedy, with a tour-de-force performance by a scenery-chewing Peter O'Toole that provides much laughter . . . but then it becomes a horrific tragedy that I, for one, did NOT expect of it. I chanced upon an episode of DICK CAVETT wherein O'Toole is interviewed, he plugging that new movie, and because it was a film of his that I hadn't seen before, I looked it up on TH-cam and -- lo! and behold -- it was available to see for free! Then, seeing it, I was quite shocked to see that end-scene which Kubrick had OBVIOUSLY 'borrowed' from.
Maybe? I’ve seen The Ruling Class a few times but it’s been awhile. I think there’s also a moment where parliament turns to skeletons in Donald Cammell and Nic Roeg’s Performance, which Kubrick might have seen when Mick Jagger was lobbying to play Alex in A Clockwork Orange
The 2 hour version is the standard one in the UK, and is the version I grew up with and fell in love with. While I don't have a problem with the longer version, Kubrick's preferred cut is a tighter, more claustrophobic experience, with the film rarely referencing the outside world and emphasising ambiguity and nightmare logic. And those skeletons look goofy.
I was in the uk and always had the longer version but that's a separate story! The shorter version has merit though not in all scenes, such as the doctor and Danny scene; as once removed it reduces more elements about Danny that in either version are not developed. Early on Danny seems pivotal then becomes less and less as the film progresses coming across to me as Stanley paying lip service to the book which is rarely a good idea as books have so much more time to play with; a book can take weeks/months to read; a film generally around two hours. But The Shining, for me, was never a horror film nor would that overly interest Stanley; what I get out of it is not only the staggering subtext; much of which is positioned right in front of us and takes 40 years to find but as a film it is so particularly well made; hypnotically so. No film then or now looked or behaved like that. The trims were due to unimpressive screenings and box office but they should have been made to the script before filming commenced. It's the kind of film we wish in some parallel universe we could dip in and out of for as long as we like and that it continues which in a way - it does. Eons ago I made a list of what is relatively masked; here's a few: close in on Jack's green tie in the interview scene - the bear rug across from the fireplace is only present when Jack is - the gold room door he walks thru to chat with Lloyd; a minute later, as seen over Jack's shoulder, it's closed - all the doors seem to have some form of consciousness, or do they; the store door struggling with Wendy as she tries to secure Jack inside it - the door seemingly opening for Jack - the missing furniture in the Colorado lounge during Jack and Wendy's night time conversation - the repetition of ice cream and how that repetition says something else particularly when spoken by O'Halloran - the all work and no play pages contains one sentence that says even more about this family (think it's in the second/third to last page that Wendy turns)! but having said that, like The Exorcist, underneath The Shining is a story about seclusion/mental illness/schizophrenia and our inability to really understand and see things as they really are. King's books tend to be simplistic and often seem geared towards teens; Stanley would rather go with the psychological though keep the audience always guessing one way or another. The irony is that today most of the stages which housed the sets are now a Tesco superstore and its car park. Who knows in the future with technology edging closer and closer allowing films to be extended and could be interesting depending on talent involved! We'd still have the original.
I've never seen the shorter edit and The Shining is one of my all time favorite films. It seems like, from this video, the footage removed takes away a bit more of the feeling that you are experiencing the everyday life of the characters. This can be seen throughout Kubrick's films like in the long journey to the moon sequence. Everything is matter of fact and not necessarily exciting. It just is. That's something I've always liked about Kubrick's storytelling. Jack passing time by disrespectfully tossing a tennis ball at the native tapestries and Halloran arranging to use his friend's SnoCat to get to the hotel are lived-in scenes that connect the dots of the day to day life of the characters. Those scenes remind me of the Marines polishing their boots in FMJ or Floyd calling his daughter from the space station on an AT&T video phone.
Then, there's the existence of different framing versions. According to the original WB DVD, it was a full frame 4:3 (but not pan & scan) that Kubrick preferred for this release. While he could have gone letterbox, he essentially removed the upper and lower mattes that formed the theatrical widescreen, revealing more picture in these zones. It really looks impressive because you see more of the ceiling and other details not in the current 16 x 9 versions.
I originally wrote a section on the different aspect ratios but wound up cutting it out. There's so much written about Kubrick's preferences for everything, and most seems to be second hand, so the further I dug the more contradictions popped up. In Kubrick's day 4:3 was the standard television ratio, where movies wound up living beyond their theatrical release. Kubrick simultaneously framed for 1.85 though, and info is lost on the sides of the 4:3 video release I used for the shorter cut (as is some info at the bottom) compared to an unmatted print frame that's online. I have read differing opinions on whether he preferred/framed for a 1.66:1 ratio for theatrical as well, but the Strangelove transfer he approved for Criterion laserdisc alternates between 1.33 & 1.66. I think Lolita did too? Don't know if he approved it, but I remember this was also the case with a Clockwork release from around the same time
Here in Europe the official version of the film was the short version. I don't consider one version better than the other, out of habit I prefer the short version I think it's more visual and ambiguous. It would be interesting to make a hybrid film with both versions. I would keep the European version as a base but adding those deleted scenes of Wendy that better define her motivation. I think the Halloran subplot works better in the short version, we don't need to know how he gets his snowcat for example. I have the same feeling with Apocalypse Now where I would take the final cut as a base but make small adjustments with the original 1979 version.
Does somebody know if the shorter (int.) cut was remastered in 4k? Beginning with the second Blu Ray edition the movie was only released with the longer US cut in Germany (on Blu Ray and 4K Blu Ray). Unfortunately they had to use different dubbing voices since 35+ years later nearly all original voice actors were dead. I also think that the longer cut makes the movie worse, so would like to watch the int. cut in 4k to check the movie again (wouldn‘t care if it is original audio or with dubbed voices)
There’s apparently a fan-made recreation of the original German release, complete with the inserts shot specifically for it. I don’t know how good/bad a job it is though, or how to get it. I don’t think there’s any way it’s above 1080p. AFAIK only the long version is in 4k, but it would be possible to cut the longer version down to the shorter one
I agree with the interpretation that there are _two_ Jacks in the The Shining. 1) Jack the author 2) Jack the horror novel character. Nicholson's Thursday 'crazy eyes' isn't _horror novel_ Jack going crazy, it's _author_ Jack suddenly getting the inspiration for his novel. We see the horror novel forming right then and there (Thursday) in his head. You can tell it's _author Jack_ having the inspiration, because he's wearing dowdy, out-of-fashion clothes as _author Jack_ tends to do. _Horror novel Jack_ wears trendier clothes (bomber jacket and jeans), burgundy and crimson colours (like the hotel staff in his novel). _That's_ why Kubrick didn't cut the 'Thursday crazy eyes' - it's THE turning point of the story.
House calls weren't even a thing in the early sixties where I lived. California. I lived in Colorado in the late seventies, I never heard of them there, either. But I was young and healthy at the time.
The stuff Kubrick cut out is redundant, deflates the tension, or is just laughable (the skeletons). And you didn't mention that the original theatrical cut was even longer: Kubrick had theaters cut out a scene from the last reel of the movie and mail it back to the studio.
I have a number of different versions of 2001, copied from TV, VHS or regular DVDs I bought. I notice the colors are quite different in different versions, and even though I can start two movies on two TVs at the exact same time, they will speed up and slow down, getting in and out of sync. I just didn't expect that with a Kubrick movie, as we hear how SK and Vitali tried to keep the new versions true to the original. I also was very annoyed with a TH-camr who was quoting the lines "wrong" from the Yale team scene in Eyes Wide Shut. But, I now think my version, a professional DVD, has edited dialogue, for some reason. My captions and sound say "buster" and "butt" where apparently other versions say "puncher" and "fudge".
I agree that the longer version is superior, but then - as an American - it's the one I grew up with. I've seen the shorter version, of course, but it suffers because it has less of that intangible, languid quality that makes the film so striking. I first saw it in the theater in 1980, and I was not that pleased with it, at first. I was already a fan of the book, and the film seemed flat by comparison. Not scary. Until the nightmares started. Now I can appreciate that Kubrick's genius was to make a film that zipped right passed my conscious mind and made a permanent place in my hind-brain, where it haunts me to this day, some 44 years later. When I watch it now (as I do often), _The Shining_ is a completely different film for me. It's full of dread and menace, and the quiet, unnerving chill of a nightmare that unfolds slowly. The kind you wake yourself up from with scream that gradually builds from a whisper to a full-throated wail. I have also come to appreciate Shelly Duvall's character arc. For the life of me, I can't see why many people are hostile to her character, painting her as weak and annoying. For God's sake, she goes from cowed to courageous in the space of two+ hours of screen time. I'd like to see any of those complainers go up against a guy with an axe while armed with only a carving knife or a baseball bat. Courage isn't a lack of fear. Strength isn't remaining stoic in the face of mortal danger. Courage and strength are the ability to fight back in spite of crippling terror and protect your son. Well done, Wendy. Well done.
I've been seeing this movie every few years since it came out when I was a child, mostly the longer version- and I just watched it again when (the longer version) aired for Halloween. Over time how I feel about Shelley Duvall's performance has changed. I really appreciate the inclusion more Wendy material, for the first time I could see how the ordinariness of her mothering Danny was the source of all her strength and I thought the way Duvall delivered it was beautiful. Really the heart of the movie for me now.
They are actually for different audiences. The European version is much more a scary story, with audiences mostly treated to a fictional yarn formed of American tropes. The American version is much more a diagnostic diagesis, which is to say an attempted dissection of the fate America is suffering under the totalitarian influences of media, social class, psychic violence, and inhumane terror as Americans themselves would actually appreciate. It’s to subconsciously assist the audience in the states to comprehend the source of their life parameters being subjects of a foreign power which works like a ghost or a demon upon their minds. From television, to the economy, to the military substructure, to corporate interests, the USA has become dominated by foreign corporations who use the mass public, the audience itself, as Guinea pigs in a great experiment upon human nature. This experiment is one of consistent degradation, meaningless violence, and pointless ruin leading to poverty, insanity, and finally, death. Americans are the subject now of these scientific tactics and the cruel viceroys of corporation whose love of spoil and causing evil make the purpose of the two cuts much different. The USA under the federal reserve bank has become much more a Stalinist USSA where all that is beloved is likewise bedeviled. Thus, the turn of the already endangered male head of household toward acts of evil. The fact that the film is itself a goad toward evil, and Kubrick himself a Euro, heightens and enhances the effect. The subtext remains hidden to most even until this day, as the experiment continues. Can you not see the US today as the same evil palimpsest, having continued until we have such detritus of horror as the recent election? He is using the figure of Danny to attempt to awaken the naive and realism haunted movie goer to reflect upon the actual horror that has become of the sleepy, tranquil continent of natural splendor as its turn now toward a psychedelic terrordrome of evil under the glare of TV and scientific brainwashing. I can feel it, fully! I want out of this maze!
I agree, but I don't think it was inevitable (I'm not saying you said that btw). I think it's taken social media to precipitate this all-time cultural low, and it's a huge challenge for us to get our collective heads around, but I think we will learn strategies and heuristics to deal with it and generally be more sceptical, which isn't a bad thing to learn anyway. Hold fast! Take care 💜
I honestly do not know which version I originally saw, or which I had on DVD and VHS etc. What with watching these youtube vids on theories and ideas, it's just a jumble of scenes of wihch I have no idea which version they were from and it's lost to the mists of time.
The shorter version ruins the rhythm of the movie for me. Plus, I think we saw a cut before Kubrick cut some stuff. I was 12 but I remember a scene where Wendy was watching Wheel of Fortune while she was preparing food in the kitchen.
![[LIVE] : ONE ลุมพินี 89 | คู่เอก "ยอดไอคิว vs คิริลล์"](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/Z3vYkHJ_5Ig/mqdefault.jpg)
Removing Halloran’s line: “ ..they turned out to be completely unreliable assholes” is a crime! 😅
@@tauruschorus the racism theme is more impactful in the USA because it’s so accepted in Europe. Probably why he erased this display of authority from Halloran in the European version.
Agree. Those moment joined to the interview and many others make it not only horrror movie...
Hi there! I come from the completely opposite side on this as someone who view the international cut to be a masterpiece and the US theatrical version not even reaching 5☆ out of 5☆.
The key to this is the motto: Show - Don't tell!.
Everything cut from the longer version are either A) unnecessary and overexplanatory exposition or B) scenes that remove tension. Notice what is being cut: Interactions with the outside world. TV watching. Dialog between people outside the hotel. By removing these bits is to remove our reference point to a normal life. It is to remove a feeling of comfort. It is to create a deeper feeling of isolation and dread.
The exposition removes doubt and ambiguity. It makes thing make sense. Once again it provides us with comfort.
A lot of the removed scenes are of the type Show AND Tell. "I am going to get my fire engine!" Danny says before going to get his fire engine. This is the way children tell stories. They tell us what is going to happen and then we see it acted out. It's a very vulgar form of moviemaking and it's not elegant. Kubrick knew this but was probably pushed by the producer to make the film more understandable. He later defended his cuts stating that the European audience were more used to ambiguity while the American audience demanded clarity.
You said at one point it would make more sense to keep the dialog and remove the travelling bits. But it's very much the opposite. The long travel scenes and silent images of oversnowed roads and traffic accidents gives us a feeling of unease (did the passengers survive?) and it makes the hotel feel so isolated and far away. The dialog on the other hand doesn't give us much of use. It just lightens the mood to finally see scenes from a gas station and a living and breathing world out there.
Then there are the scenes that just didn't work. The scene where Tony takes over Danny's body is so blatantly inspired by the massively successful The Exorcist. That scene makes Kubrick look like less of an auteur and more of a copycat. My guess is that Kubrick felt embarrassed when he saw it in the cinema. And then the derpy looking skeletons. They just looked like some cheap haunted house props and only served to remove ambiguity as it strengthens us in our conviction that something supernatural actually is going on.
Then there is the pacing. When I hear people complain that Jack gets crazy too fast, that objection always seem to come from viewers of the US cut. Because his transformation really is jarring after the lenghty introduction with the doctor etc. But in the quicker pace of the international cut it doesn't seem so out of place. We see this as part of the premise. Something that we know almost from the start.
You also pointed out that many cuts were so short that they hardly made a difference. But they do. All together all those removed seconds and half seconds makes the film flow better and makes the film a much leaner experience. The US cut drags. It becomes boring. Add the exposition and we get bored by the images. Without the exposition we search every corner of the frame to try to piece things together ourselves. And this is how a film like this should work. It should activate the viewer to fill in the blanks and find their own interpretations.
very well-explained, solid reasoning, well done
Fair enough counterpoint although I personally disagree. There's nothing that shows OR tells the audience in the first half of the international cut that Jack is an alcoholic or hurt Danny in the past. And if the cut removed that all together, it'd be one thing, but it still includes it in the Lloyd bar scene, but that's over an hour into the film. That's way too poorly paced of a revelation. In this case, Kubrick neither showed NOR told us that in the first half.
Also, just my personal opinion, but the scene with Wendy and the doctor is among the best scenes of the movie. It perfectly shows, not tells, that Wendy is in complete fear and awe of Jack, despite her dialogue saying literally the exact opposite. The rest of the cuts I can take or leave (he was 100% right to cut those fucking awful skeletons!) but the doctor scene is absolutely needed.
@ericjohnson9623 Well, I disagree obviously. This is exactly the kind of exposition that was dead weight. To leave the revelation to the bar scene is perfect. It's just enough information and the fact that it comes from an unreliable narrator (the perpetrator himself) ensures that the explanation still stays open for interpretation.
I think ambiguity is the difference between mainstream cinema and art house cinema. The US Theatrical cut is a much more of a mainstream movie while the international cut sits comfortably in the art house section. But there is a reason why art house movies doesn't enjoy huge commercial success and that's because it is making a big part of the audience uncomfortable. It's understandable that not everyone likes the international cut for that reason. But I think it's a damned shame that it is now almost fading away from distribution without getting the 4K treatment.
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The scene near the end when Wendy sees the lobby full of cobwebbed skeletons was a visual 'echo' of a scene near the end of the movie "THE RULING CLASS" starring Peter O'Toole, the story of a madcap aristocrat -- the son of an English earl who dies from what appears to be autoerotic asphyxiation -- whose family stages an 'intervention' to disabuse him of the delusion that he's Jesus Christ . . . which tragically results in him adopting the scarier delusion that he's actually Jack the Ripper. At the end of the film, he's being invested with the title of Earl, taking over his late-father's hereditary rank among the Ruling Class . . . and the scene at Parliament becomes darkly psychedelic, with the other M.P.s appearing as cobwebbed skeletons (this imagery being what Kubrick was 'echoing' in THE SHiNiNG), with Peter O'Toole's 'Jack' character then -- SPOILER ALERT!!! -- murdering his own wife.
One might argue that Wendy Torrance had seen that Peter O'Toole movie and -- when the craziness becomes apparent to her in the wake of Hallorann's murder, that bloodshed suddenly attuning her to the presence of the Supernatural in that haunted hotel -- her own memory of seeing that movie's ending, of a wife character being murdered by a husband named 'Jack', causes her to 'see' that movie's imagery coming to life there, in that lobby of the Overlook Hotel.
Thematically, the Overlook represents the ground zero of American political power -- a counterpart to the British Parliament chambers -- built upon the genocidal violence perpetrated against the Natives, where all "the best people" go during its open season, from May the 1st until the end of October (i.e. Halloween), where 4 Presidents had stayed, etc.
More fans of Kubrick's movie need to know about -- and actually see -- that earlier film, "THE RULING CLASS." It starts off as a zany comedy, with a tour-de-force performance by a scenery-chewing Peter O'Toole that provides much laughter . . . but then it becomes a horrific tragedy that I, for one, did NOT expect of it. I chanced upon an episode of DICK CAVETT wherein O'Toole is interviewed, he plugging that new movie, and because it was a film of his that I hadn't seen before, I looked it up on TH-cam and -- lo! and behold -- it was available to see for free! Then, seeing it, I was quite shocked to see that end-scene which Kubrick had OBVIOUSLY 'borrowed' from.
Maybe? I’ve seen The Ruling Class a few times but it’s been awhile. I think there’s also a moment where parliament turns to skeletons in Donald Cammell and Nic Roeg’s Performance, which Kubrick might have seen when Mick Jagger was lobbying to play Alex in A Clockwork Orange
Dude, enjoyed the vid! Excited to see what you do next!
I prefer the longer version. In some way it makes things both clearer and more opaque.
The 2 hour version is the standard one in the UK, and is the version I grew up with and fell in love with. While I don't have a problem with the longer version, Kubrick's preferred cut is a tighter, more claustrophobic experience, with the film rarely referencing the outside world and emphasising ambiguity and nightmare logic. And those skeletons look goofy.
I agree about the skeletons, it's the one thing I wish hadn't been included in the film at all.
I was in the uk and always had the longer version but that's a separate story! The shorter version has merit though not in all scenes, such as the doctor and Danny scene; as once removed it reduces more elements about Danny that in either version are not developed. Early on Danny seems pivotal then becomes less and less as the film progresses coming across to me as Stanley paying lip service to the book which is rarely a good idea as books have so much more time to play with; a book can take weeks/months to read; a film generally around two hours. But The Shining, for me, was never a horror film nor would that overly interest Stanley; what I get out of it is not only the staggering subtext; much of which is positioned right in front of us and takes 40 years to find but as a film it is so particularly well made; hypnotically so. No film then or now looked or behaved like that. The trims were due to unimpressive screenings and box office but they should have been made to the script before filming commenced. It's the kind of film we wish in some parallel universe we could dip in and out of for as long as we like and that it continues which in a way - it does. Eons ago I made a list of what is relatively masked; here's a few: close in on Jack's green tie in the interview scene - the bear rug across from the fireplace is only present when Jack is - the gold room door he walks thru to chat with Lloyd; a minute later, as seen over Jack's shoulder, it's closed - all the doors seem to have some form of consciousness, or do they; the store door struggling with Wendy as she tries to secure Jack inside it - the door seemingly opening for Jack - the missing furniture in the Colorado lounge during Jack and Wendy's night time conversation - the repetition of ice cream and how that repetition says something else particularly when spoken by O'Halloran - the all work and no play pages contains one sentence that says even more about this family (think it's in the second/third to last page that Wendy turns)! but having said that, like The Exorcist, underneath The Shining is a story about seclusion/mental illness/schizophrenia and our inability to really understand and see things as they really are. King's books tend to be simplistic and often seem geared towards teens; Stanley would rather go with the psychological though keep the audience always guessing one way or another. The irony is that today most of the stages which housed the sets are now a Tesco superstore and its car park. Who knows in the future with technology edging closer and closer allowing films to be extended and could be interesting depending on talent involved! We'd still have the original.
I've always loved the skeleton scene. It's like the Overlook pulling off it's mask for a moment.
Really cool bro, liked the video
I've never seen the shorter edit and The Shining is one of my all time favorite films. It seems like, from this video, the footage removed takes away a bit more of the feeling that you are experiencing the everyday life of the characters. This can be seen throughout Kubrick's films like in the long journey to the moon sequence. Everything is matter of fact and not necessarily exciting. It just is. That's something I've always liked about Kubrick's storytelling. Jack passing time by disrespectfully tossing a tennis ball at the native tapestries and Halloran arranging to use his friend's SnoCat to get to the hotel are lived-in scenes that connect the dots of the day to day life of the characters.
Those scenes remind me of the Marines polishing their boots in FMJ or Floyd calling his daughter from the space station on an AT&T video phone.
Then, there's the existence of different framing versions. According to the original WB DVD, it was a full frame 4:3 (but not pan & scan) that Kubrick preferred for this release. While he could have gone letterbox, he essentially removed the upper and lower mattes that formed the theatrical widescreen, revealing more picture in these zones. It really looks impressive because you see more of the ceiling and other details not in the current 16 x 9 versions.
I originally wrote a section on the different aspect ratios but wound up cutting it out. There's so much written about Kubrick's preferences for everything, and most seems to be second hand, so the further I dug the more contradictions popped up. In Kubrick's day 4:3 was the standard television ratio, where movies wound up living beyond their theatrical release. Kubrick simultaneously framed for 1.85 though, and info is lost on the sides of the 4:3 video release I used for the shorter cut (as is some info at the bottom) compared to an unmatted print frame that's online. I have read differing opinions on whether he preferred/framed for a 1.66:1 ratio for theatrical as well, but the Strangelove transfer he approved for Criterion laserdisc alternates between 1.33 & 1.66. I think Lolita did too? Don't know if he approved it, but I remember this was also the case with a Clockwork release from around the same time
Here in Europe the official version of the film was the short version. I don't consider one version better than the other, out of habit I prefer the short version I think it's more visual and ambiguous.
It would be interesting to make a hybrid film with both versions. I would keep the European version as a base but adding those deleted scenes of Wendy that better define her motivation.
I think the Halloran subplot works better in the short version, we don't need to know how he gets his snowcat for example.
I have the same feeling with Apocalypse Now where I would take the final cut as a base but make small adjustments with the original 1979 version.
Never saw the 2 hour version. Never knew it existed.
I never knew there was a version outside the 2 hr version! You poor b’stard
Great vid. I hope your channel takes off. Liked & subscribed.
Documentary "Room 237" claims that movie runs backwards, perfect synchronization, but it works only on shorter version.
Fellow ARP 2600 user 😊
Thank god I watched the longer version
Good job! Thanks for the video
The doctor's visit is the only thing I don't like about the U.S. cut.
Does somebody know if the shorter (int.) cut was remastered in 4k? Beginning with the second Blu Ray edition the movie was only released with the longer US cut in Germany (on Blu Ray and 4K Blu Ray).
Unfortunately they had to use different dubbing voices since 35+ years later nearly all original voice actors were dead.
I also think that the longer cut makes the movie worse, so would like to watch the int. cut in 4k to check the movie again (wouldn‘t care if it is original audio or with dubbed voices)
There’s apparently a fan-made recreation of the original German release, complete with the inserts shot specifically for it. I don’t know how good/bad a job it is though, or how to get it. I don’t think there’s any way it’s above 1080p. AFAIK only the long version is in 4k, but it would be possible to cut the longer version down to the shorter one
This was well done thanks!
Interesting video, you should do more
I agree with the interpretation that there are _two_ Jacks in the The Shining.
1) Jack the author
2) Jack the horror novel character.
Nicholson's Thursday 'crazy eyes' isn't _horror novel_ Jack going crazy, it's _author_ Jack suddenly getting the inspiration for his novel. We see the horror novel forming right then and there (Thursday) in his head.
You can tell it's _author Jack_ having the inspiration, because he's wearing dowdy, out-of-fashion clothes as _author Jack_ tends to do.
_Horror novel Jack_ wears trendier clothes (bomber jacket and jeans), burgundy and crimson colours (like the hotel staff in his novel).
_That's_ why Kubrick didn't cut the 'Thursday crazy eyes' - it's THE turning point of the story.
House calls weren't even a thing in the early sixties where I lived. California. I lived in Colorado in the late seventies, I never heard of them there, either. But I was young and healthy at the time.
6:00 Kubrick didnt live in the US so it isn’t surprising that he might not have immediately gotten the “here’s Johnny” reference.
I suppose it go either way, really. Kubrick moved to the UK around the same time Carson took over the Tonight Show.
Only YOU can prevent forest fires! Great video. 😊
Saw the edited version on tv first then the extended cut on in-flight movie, added to the expierence
The stuff Kubrick cut out is redundant, deflates the tension, or is just laughable (the skeletons). And you didn't mention that the original theatrical cut was even longer: Kubrick had theaters cut out a scene from the last reel of the movie and mail it back to the studio.
I have a number of different versions of 2001, copied from TV, VHS or regular DVDs I bought. I notice the colors are quite different in different versions, and even though I can start two movies on two TVs at the exact same time, they will speed up and slow down, getting in and out of sync. I just didn't expect that with a Kubrick movie, as we hear how SK and Vitali tried to keep the new versions true to the original. I also was very annoyed with a TH-camr who was quoting the lines "wrong" from the Yale team scene in Eyes Wide Shut. But, I now think my version, a professional DVD, has edited dialogue, for some reason. My captions and sound say "buster" and "butt" where apparently other versions say "puncher" and "fudge".
I'm new to your channel and just liked and subbed. Well done. Now, what's your take on Lynch's Mulholland Drive?
Don't you mean 130?
I agree that the longer version is superior, but then - as an American - it's the one I grew up with. I've seen the shorter version, of course, but it suffers because it has less of that intangible, languid quality that makes the film so striking. I first saw it in the theater in 1980, and I was not that pleased with it, at first. I was already a fan of the book, and the film seemed flat by comparison. Not scary.
Until the nightmares started. Now I can appreciate that Kubrick's genius was to make a film that zipped right passed my conscious mind and made a permanent place in my hind-brain, where it haunts me to this day, some 44 years later. When I watch it now (as I do often), _The Shining_ is a completely different film for me. It's full of dread and menace, and the quiet, unnerving chill of a nightmare that unfolds slowly. The kind you wake yourself up from with scream that gradually builds from a whisper to a full-throated wail.
I have also come to appreciate Shelly Duvall's character arc. For the life of me, I can't see why many people are hostile to her character, painting her as weak and annoying. For God's sake, she goes from cowed to courageous in the space of two+ hours of screen time. I'd like to see any of those complainers go up against a guy with an axe while armed with only a carving knife or a baseball bat. Courage isn't a lack of fear. Strength isn't remaining stoic in the face of mortal danger. Courage and strength are the ability to fight back in spite of crippling terror and protect your son.
Well done, Wendy. Well done.
“As soon as possible!”😂
@ I see what you did there. Just remember who’s holding the bat…
I've been seeing this movie every few years since it came out when I was a child, mostly the longer version- and I just watched it again when (the longer version) aired for Halloween. Over time how I feel about Shelley Duvall's performance has changed. I really appreciate the inclusion more Wendy material, for the first time I could see how the ordinariness of her mothering Danny was the source of all her strength and I thought the way Duvall delivered it was beautiful. Really the heart of the movie for me now.
They are actually for different audiences. The European version is much more a scary story, with audiences mostly treated to a fictional yarn formed of American tropes. The American version is much more a diagnostic diagesis, which is to say an attempted dissection of the fate America is suffering under the totalitarian influences of media, social class, psychic violence, and inhumane terror as Americans themselves would actually appreciate. It’s to subconsciously assist the audience in the states to comprehend the source of their life parameters being subjects of a foreign power which works like a ghost or a demon upon their minds. From television, to the economy, to the military substructure, to corporate interests, the USA has become dominated by foreign corporations who use the mass public, the audience itself, as Guinea pigs in a great experiment upon human nature. This experiment is one of consistent degradation, meaningless violence, and pointless ruin leading to poverty, insanity, and finally, death. Americans are the subject now of these scientific tactics and the cruel viceroys of corporation whose love of spoil and causing evil make the purpose of the two cuts much different. The USA under the federal reserve bank has become much more a Stalinist USSA where all that is beloved is likewise bedeviled. Thus, the turn of the already endangered male head of household toward acts of evil. The fact that the film is itself a goad toward evil, and Kubrick himself a Euro, heightens and enhances the effect. The subtext remains hidden to most even until this day, as the experiment continues. Can you not see the US today as the same evil palimpsest, having continued until we have such detritus of horror as the recent election? He is using the figure of Danny to attempt to awaken the naive and realism haunted movie goer to reflect upon the actual horror that has become of the sleepy, tranquil continent of natural splendor as its turn now toward a psychedelic terrordrome of evil under the glare of TV and scientific brainwashing. I can feel it, fully! I want out of this maze!
I think its just a horror movie
@@CandidaRosa889 Most just want to have a beer and fall asleep. Enjoy, consumer! You have earned it!🤓
Keir Starmer just told the people of the UK they have been the victims of an open borders experiment that has failed.
I agree, but I don't think it was inevitable (I'm not saying you said that btw). I think it's taken social media to precipitate this all-time cultural low, and it's a huge challenge for us to get our collective heads around, but I think we will learn strategies and heuristics to deal with it and generally be more sceptical, which isn't a bad thing to learn anyway. Hold fast! Take care 💜
@@CandidaRosa889 I can't say it was a horror film for me. It's too particular to easily fit in any category and all the better for it!
I honestly do not know which version I originally saw, or which I had on DVD and VHS etc. What with watching these youtube vids on theories and ideas, it's just a jumble of scenes of wihch I have no idea which version they were from and it's lost to the mists of time.
solid research, imo
longer version is not good, sorry
The shorter version ruins the rhythm of the movie for me. Plus, I think we saw a cut before Kubrick cut some stuff. I was 12 but I remember a scene where Wendy was watching Wheel of Fortune while she was preparing food in the kitchen.
It's such an ugly, simplistic film. The script is poor.
Kubrick mindlessly stole the twins from Diane Arbus.
I grew up with the short version but the long version is far superior and my preferred cut.