Room 237 (2013)

[baumer]

Discuss

[baumer]

So the reason Kubrick made 'The Shining' was to prove to us that he had faked the entire moon landing video. 

No wait, it's actually about the genocide of the Native American Indians...

No, I'm wrong again, it's all about the Holocaust.

These are just a few of the many theories that Room 237 proposes. This documentary, which never shows the faces of those talking, is an interesting piece that seems to offer more than it can deliver. The idea of hidden meanings in film, conspiracies and real intentions are what dragged me into this feature. Those elements will drag me into anything really. Throw on top of that Stanley Kubrick, a methodical dictator of a director (to some) and you'll believe that there truly must be some other motive behind the picture. 

That is...until you see Room 237 and come to understand that what Kubrick was really doing, was having fun with the horror tropes we see in so many films. There are about 6 people in Room 237 each with their own theories on what 'The Shining' really means and the film is broken into 9 parts. So it does get a bit lengthy clocking in at almost 2 hours. I can pinpoint the moment I knew that this film was trouble.

The one theory that made me laugh out loud and realize that the grasping at straws was beyond what I could imagine is when we are given a frame by frame explanation of what a particular scene really means. The scene? Jack is introduced to the hotel owner, Ullman. The guy speaking, whose name I cannot remember because they only appear once and we never see their face, goes on to explain how the film is really about sexuality, the fear and obsession of it.So when Ullman stands up and walks around the desk to shake hands with Jack, as soon as their hands meet, the picture pauses. He is standing in front of his desk and a stack of papers in a tray is oddly placed on the desk to make it appear that Ullman has a massive erection. Thus the film is about sexuality. 

Far fetched? Indeed.

In what I hoped would be some deep analysis of a film from one of the greatest directors of our time, I instead got a bunch of crackpots having too much time on their hands. I will say that I did think one or two were interesting. At one point the film is played forward and backwards at the same time, superimposed over each other. As it was "meant" to be seen. Thus we get images off blood rushing from the elevator while we are on a closeup of Jack's face. We see the two girls for the first time, while they hover over Wendy. More and more, interesting to see, a lot of it is still left to the imagination. 

I don't know why people ignore continuity mistakes and think they mean something when they don't, but that is the majority of this film. Before the internet, when everyone believed in coincidence, none of this would have gotten to my attention. Did the film make me want to see The Shining again? Not really, it made me want to give 2001: A Space Odyssey another shot. 

Weird? Maybe 2001 is a companion piece to "The Shining", wait...something already has that theory in Room 237

 

4/10

[CoolioD1]

All the way through this I imagined Kubrick watching this documentary and laughing his ass off.

[Hatebox]

I thought the point of the doc was to convey how crazy fandom can be. As such, the fact that the theories were frequently insane is not to the detriment of the film. Quite the opposite.

Edited September 14, 2013 by Hatebox

[baumer]

That may be so. But the over analying of an Indian name on a can just brought me out of the movie....and that was the beginning.

[mattmav45]

I'm not really sure what the hell they were trying to do here, but this was pretty awful.

 

It's one thing if the documentary was supposed to serve as an analysis of obsession and fanaticism, but instead these theories are simply presented in a straightforward, bland fashion.  After about 30 minutes you stop giving a rat's ass and wish they would just call these morons out for the lunatics they are.

[Hatebox]

The most convincing Shining analysis I've ever read (here, but be warned: it's exhaustive) wasn't even included in the movie. Apparently the author was asked, but didn't want to be lumped with a bunch of other theories he thought were patently ridiculous.

[Michael Gary Scott]

This movie is a joke. 1.5/5