Room 237
Directed by Rodney Ascher
Five fans of THE SHINING explain their bizarre theories about the film's true meaning in this must-see doc about the passion Stanley Kubrick's classic horror film inspires in viewers. One fan thinks the film is about the slaughter of Native Americans, while another thinks it's about the supposedly faked Apollo 11 moon landing. But whether you agree with their outlandish conjectures (and no contradictory historical evidence is included) or not is less the point than the power cinematic creations have to lodge themselves in our brain and never let go. Contains violence and gore.
Five fans of THE SHINING explain their bizarre theories about the film's true meaning.
Cast: Bill Blakemore, Geoffrey Cocks, Juli Kearns
Member Reviews
Unwatchably dull, snide and pedantic, though a few parts--like how the hotel, architecturally, couldn't exist, and the question of whether Jack is hallucinating right from the beginning--are admittedly interesting.
It was fun, but upon realizing the director wasn’t driving home a point about how absurdities result from over analysis, the film lost its shine, so to speak.
Shining is my fav, so this one is comfort food. It’s because of this movie that I have come to notice other subtle details throughout the movie (like how Wendy is dressed exactly like the Goofy doll on the wall in Dannys bedroom).
Obviously the subjects are silly, but the amount of people utterly disregarding the native genocide theory is troubling- the hotel is literally, textually built over a Native American burial ground, the white man’s burden line is totally pertinent to Jack’s insanity (“new caught, sullen peoples, half devil and half child”) and the about of people who interpret this film as a right wing, pro ignorance message of “subtext doesn’t exist, semiotics don’t exist” is appalling. Anyway, this is a great little documentary about semiotic interpretation without grounding or self critique.
An absolutely useless documentary