Eighties Kids
  • News
  • Celebrity
  • Movies
  • Music
  • Television

The Shining

Although it received a tepid response upon its 1980 release, Stanley Kubrick's The Shining has since been hailed as "the most stately, artful horror ever made," and is considered one of the most terrifying films of all time.

Adapted from the landmark Stephen King novel of the same name, The Shining sees aspiring writer Jack Torrance (Jack Nicholson) take a job as a caretaker at the mysterious Overlook Hotel for the winter months. While there, he and his family (Shelley Duvall and Danny Lloyd) encounter a series of strange and horrifying situations that ultimately drive Torrance mad.

The film has become infamous for the scene in which Torrance tears through a door with an axe in an attempt to kill his wife and child. It was revealed in Making The Shining, a fly-on-the-wall documentary created by Kubrick's daughter, Vivian, that Shelley Duvall collapsed from exhaustion after providing a series of escalatingly hysterical takes. Nicholson's infamous line, "Here's Johnny!", taken from The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson, originally fell on deaf ears with the British Kubrick and was nearly cut. It has since become one of the most enduring lines in film history.

The Shining was something of a sleeper hit at the box office, ultimately grossing $46.2 million on a budget of $19 million, though critical responses were mixed. A Variety review pilloried the film, lamenting that "Kubrick has teamed with jumpy Jack Nicholson to destroy all that was so terrifying about Stephen King's bestseller." King himself was similarly nonplussed, and even supervised a rival version made for television. In retrospect, the miniseries has been compared unfavourably to Kubrick's film.


STORIES

  • Movies

36 Classic Movie Moments That Were Completely Improvised

  • Movies

15 Stephen King Films Better Than The Books They Were Based On, And 15 That Were Worse

  • Movies

15 Stephen King Films Better Than The Books They Were Based On, And 15 That Were Worse

  • News

An Isolating Couple Is Recreating Classic Movie Moments While In Quarantine

  • Movies

15 Stephen King Films Better Than The Books They Were Based On, And 15 That Were Worse

  • Movies

10 80s Movies That Taught Us Valuable Life Lessons

  • Movies

20 Films That Prove The 1980s Was The Greatest Decade

  • Movies

20 Horror Movies That Were Inspired By Spooky Real-Life Locations

  • Movies

20 Hilariously Negative Reviews Of Classic Movies

  • Movies

20 Horror Movies That Defined The 1980s

  • Movies

Heeeere’s 20 Things You Never Knew About Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining

  • Movies

How Many Of These 10 Classic Horror Movies Did You See When You Were Too Young?

  • Movies

20 Movie Urban Legends (That Aren’t Actually True)

  • Movies

10 Of The Biggest Marmite Films Of The 1980’s

  • Celebrity

Remember The Grady Girls From ‘The Shining’? Here They Are Now!

  • Movies

Bizarre Fan Theories About Your Favourite 80s Movies

  • Movies

10 Ways The Shining Set Itself Apart In The Horror Movie Scene

  • Movies
  • Nostalgia

Our Top 10 Greatest Stephen King Film Adaptations

  • Television

‘The Shining’ May Prove The Moon Landing Was Fake

Eighties Kids
  • About Us
  • Privacy & Cookie Policy
  • Contact Us

© 80s Kids 2022 All Rights Reserved