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Destiny in The Shining
There seems to be no freewill in Stanley Kubrick films. Characters are often brought to a predetermined fate by some sort of powerful entity. This is evident in Dave’s journey to becoming the Starchild in 2001: A Space Odyssey, Alex’s rebirth in A Clockwork Orange, and in Barry’s rise and fall in Barry Lyndon. In his 1980 film, The Shining, director Kubrick constructs destiny in time and space by utilizing both narrative and formal techniques.
Take, for instance, the first image: Jack’s car riding through the mountainous hills on his way to the Overlook Hotel, filmed by a hovering helicopter. Had this been a normal film this could be viewed as something to merely show the credits over. However, it is a Stanley Kubrick film and holds a far great purpose. Jack is on his way to the Overlook for his job interview or, as Kubrick would view it, as a major step in his destiny with the Overlook. Like the battlefield march in Barry Lyndon, Jack’s approach to his fate is not interfered with by the curves and tunnels of the road. Not even the police car he passed upon coming out of the tunnel stops Jack from approaching his destiny with the Overlook Hotel and his first major step: the job interview.
This visual path to destiny is also utilized and parallelled in one other scene. During the film’s final act, Holleran’s journey to the Overlook includes a symmetrical shot of his lone Snowcat plowing through a path framed with lines of trees. Holleran’s fate is, of course, simular to Jack’s. He is murdered by the Hotel, which is using Jack as a conduit.
Through out the film, Kubrick utilizes title cards to inform the audience of, mainly, the narrative’s position in time. For instance, we see numerous title cards like "Closing Day", "A Month Later", "Tuesday", and "Saturday" to ellipse the forward progression of time. However, Kubrick’s first title card is not to inform the audience of a time but rather an event, Jack’s job interview. Could Kubrick not utilize the dialogue and narrative to inform the audience of this event? We become aware while Jack is at the Overlook that he is there for a job interview, why tell us aside from that? Kubrick tells us because it has already been determined. As seen in the final image of the film, Jack Torrence has been a part of the Overlook Hotel forever; this step only solidifies his destiny. Even Jack says he has a strange feeling of deja-vu upon entering the hotel; it is his destiny to be with the Overlook.
Like the voice-over narration in Barry Lyndon, Kubrick’s use of this title card eliminates the entire surprise element and tells us what is going to happen before it actually does. This furthers the destiny aspect of The Shining. Jack’s destiny has already been pre-determined by the God of the film, the Overlook. It knows of the interview and tells us before it actually occurs. Even Danny’s friend Tony is aware that Jack will be getting the job before he does. He tells Danny that Jack will be calling Wendy any minute to tell her the news. A moment later we hear the phone ring. Jack’s destiny is already determined for him; in Kubrick’s world of The Shining there is no freewill.
Another visual trait that Kubrick utilizes to make it obvious that it is outside forces controlling Jack is in a number of establishing shots. For example, the opening not only serves as a visual representation of Jack’s road to destiny but also as a visual composition of nature presiding over Jack. The shadows of the trees eclipse Jack’s Volkwagen Beetle as Kubrick’s camera comes down and almost runs into Jack’s car, but diverges upon a different road to destiny. This opening shot of nature seems to head the pyramid of control over Jack’s road to destiny, followed by the Overlook. This pyramid of control is evident in a number of the establishing shots following Kubrick’s use of the title cards. Kubrick begins by giving the audience looming shots of the Hotel, shadowed only by a large mountain. However, this quickly evolves into the climaxing shots of nature overtaking the Overlook overtaking the Torrence family.
The lack of freewill ties in further with the narrative later in the film. Before Jack’s possession by the hotel, he quips at the vacant bar that he would "sell his soul" for a drink. Instantly a bartender and booze appear; the devil has taken his offer. The bartender refuses Jack’s money, telling him that it is of no use to him here. In other words, the hotel will collect its tab at a later time. Jack is then down in the hotel. Not only does a bartender appear, but also, upon his next visit after visiting the woman in 217, a gala is taking place. Grady, the previous caretaker, tells Jack that he is the caretaker, always has been and always will be. Kubrick not only makes it appear in the film's narrative that evil inhabits the hotel, but visually as well.
The first example stems from room 217 sequence, which seems to be a narrative and visual representation of Jack’s destiny catching up with his present self. In the final shots of the film, we are shown Jack in a photograph from 1921. He has been part of the Overlook since and seems to inhabit two time periods: 1921 and 1980. However, it is in room 217 that the two Jacks seem to run into one another. Kubrick represents this visually by aging the woman Jack encounters in the room from a young woman to a decomposing corpse literally and by cutting back to scenes of the young woman in the bathtub replaced with the older version.
Kubrick also visualizes this complexity in time and lack of freewill in two parallelling settings: the hedge maze and the endless mazing corridors of the Overlook. The maze visually represents Jack’s path to destiny. There is only one way in and out and this path is what becomes symbolic of Jack’s pre-destination with the Hotel. Temporally, the maze represents the situation that occurs in room 217: time turning in upon itself to one common destination, the center of the maze or Jack’s two halves becoming one in room 217. However, ironically enough, Jack can not make his way through the maze in the film’s climax. This seems to be foreshadowed by Jack’s gazing down upon the model of the maze in the opening hour of the film. The model appears to be much larger than it is in reality. While it visually represents Jack’s looming control over his family, it also foreshadows his demise.
This analysis also extends into the corridors of the Overlook. Unlike Jack, Danny can both navigate the maze and the corridors without difficulty. This, quite possibly, is because of Danny’s ability to "shine". With this gift, Danny has access to both the past and the future and can maneuver through time and space without the difficulty Jack encounters. It almost seems that Danny and Wendy’s fates are somehow separate from Jack’s destiny with the Overlook. The only visual instance when the Overlook, visually, appears to have control over the mother and son is during the scene in which Jack gazes down into the model of the maze. However, the Overlook must utilize Jack in order to bring forth the destiny, death, it has in mind for Wendy and Danny. This, of course, fails and while the Overlook’s ideal destiny for Jack, mainly him killing his family, does not occur, his destiny with the Hotel is turned into reality.
Danny, however, is blind to one aspect of the Hotel’s event on the temporal line, the pre-determined claiming of his father. Danny has the ability to "see" into the collective memory of the Hotel. From Grady’s homicidal crime scene, Grady’s twins, to the lady in 217, Danny seems to be aware of almost every historical event that has taken place in the hotel. Tony, Danny’s invisible friend, also seems to know a bit about the future of the Overlook. As previously noted, Tony is aware of Jack’s successful job interview before Jack himself is. The only property that makes Jack’s destiny different than that of the other events Danny has the ability to see is that it causes a temporal disjuncture that only repaired after Jack’s venture into room 217, possibly causing Danny’s lapse into a catatonic state.
Aside from the woman in 217, Kubrick also visualizes the evil of the Overlook in another shot. Numerous times during the film we are shown the infamous shot of blood pouring out of the elevator walls. Tony and Danny encounter this vision before leaving for the Overlook as does Dick when Danny uses the shining. However, during Wendy’s vision of this, Kubrick adds in a previously non-existant door between the two elevators. Wendy runs into a newly existant door between the two elevator shafts and views the ghosts of the hotel. She is inside the haunted walls and is seeing what inhabits them and her husband. She gazes upon the ballroom, filled with skeltons, as well as the murderous past of the hotel, and some of the other scandals which have become part of the history of the hotel.
That is what brings us to the final image of the film. Throughout the film, Kubrick is providing "real time" and ellipsed moments in time. For example, he uses dissolving overlaps to ellipse time during Jack’s disassembling of the radio. Kubrick shows him walking towards the door and, upon his entering, overlaps to Jack already into the room. This could be interpreted, again, as Jack’s destiny catching up with him. Kubrick contrasts these dissolving overlaps with his un-broken steadicam shots. However, these are not the only visual elements Kubrick uses to construct time. As previously noted, Kubrick utilizes title cards numerous times. Kubrick starts off with "Tuesday", "A Month Later" until he slows to "8 A.M." and "4 P.M.". His ellipsis is slowing until he reaches the final image of the film: Jack being literally frozen and frozen in time in the photograph of the Overlook in 1921. As Alexander Walker writes in his text, Stanley Kubrick, Director, this event takes place on July 4th, 1921, Independence Day. Jack, ironically, has none. He is not independent from his destiny with the Overlook; it has claimed him and he is now part of its walls forever.
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