The Shining (1980)

A man, his son and wife become the winter caretakers of an isolated hotel where Danny, the son, sees disturbing visions of the hotel's past using a telepathic gift known as "The Shining". The father, Jack Torrance, is underway in a writing project when he slowly slips into insanity as a result of cabin fever and former guests of the hotel's ghosts. After being convinced by a waiter's ghost to "correct" the family, Jack goes completely insane. The only thing that can save Danny and his mother is "The Shining". (IMDb)

Time hasn't diminished the effect: this is still a scary movie from one of the industry's greatest directors.

There are many striking features about the film. First, who would expect to see a true horror movie shot mostly in bright daylight and in such perfect setting? Quite the opposite to all the Dracula types of movies that had been so common and that honored cinema screens up till then. 

Did I say perfect setting? More like modern Gothic, in a way. Or maybe Kubrick was subtlety poking fun at prior so-called horror flicks that had the inevitable dark castle setting on hill, with lightning crashing around most of the time?

Then, we have Jack Nicholson playing a role tailored for him. How could it not be, after seeing how well he did in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest? Some might argue he was over the top, a caricature almost, of a man who truly goes insane. Watching him, however, I think his performance reminded me all too well of insane people I've met in real life.

Shelley Duval is very well cast as the already nervous wife, Wendy (and, I read that Stanley Kubrick made her even more nervous with his need for perfection). And, hats off to young Danny Lloyd.

If this is a movie you've missed, I highly recommend it.

I'll give it 8 out of 10 stars.