I was lucky enough this past May to attend the Cannes Film Festival. In between the dozens of films from a variety of different festivals in the city, I was also able to grab a ticket for a midnight showing of The Shining. The film was presented by Alfonso Cuarón and Stanley Kubrick's daughter, Katharine, having been digitally remastered in 4K by Leon Vitali, Kubrick's long-time assistant.
Sitting feet away from an unfathomably large screen in one of the biggest movie theaters I'd ever been in, I discovered an incredibly deep appreciation for the film that I hadn't experienced the only other time I'd seen it, watching it from a desk chair pointed at my roommate's laptop. Having just raced from a screening of a documentary about film sound (Making Waves: The Art of Cinematic Sound), I took special note of the way the speakers filled every corner of the huge theater with the haunting score as the camera swept over the scenery of the opening extreme long shot of the ride up to the Overlook Hotel.
It was a transformative experience for me as a moviegoer, to sit in this room and be fully and completely immersed in an iconic piece of American horror, surrounded by people who love movies enough to dedicate 10 days of their life to the nonstop consumption of them, not to mention directors like Cuarón who credit this film for igniting their desire to craft their own movies.
By another stroke of luck, I managed to attend an early screening of Doctor Sleep a few weeks ago. The film is an adaptation of Stephen King's sequel to The Shining and its trailers repeatedly reference the original movie. The score from Kubrick's film is a steady undercurrent between shots of the rotted Overlook Hotel and an adult Danny Torrence (played by Ewan McGregor) wandering its halls. Some moments are pure recreations of scenes from the original film: the eerie twin girls in the hallway, the viscerally red wave of blood pouring from the elevator.
Even without this marketing, Doctor Sleep by its very nature has big shoes to fill as a sequel to what's frequently called the best horror film of all time. And yet, Doctor Sleep strikes out on its own, diverging from the tone, pace, and world of the first film. Where Kubrick's film is all about suspense and slow movement towards the action of the climax, Doctor Sleep splits itself between three storylines: one following adult Danny as he attempts to escape the traumas of his past, one about a child psychic learning more about the extent of her abilities, and one introducing a group of creatures who eat the souls of children with the shining. It's a film that's a lot more interested in magic, worldbuilding, and action. With some slight adjustments to the first two hours, namely replacing the term 'shining' for some other description for telepathic powers, you wouldn't be able to tell it was related to the Kubrick film at all.
It's a movie with its own merits, with clever concepts and stunning visuals. Although I'd predict that nostalgia for the original was what brought most of the audience to the Parkway Theater on a Monday night, just as it brought so many film buffs to the theater in Cannes, Doctor Sleep proves itself to be a gripping movie in its own right. The audience genuinely connected with the film, the theater filling with gasps, shouts, and laughs as the narrative progressed.
Yet, Doctor Sleep still delivers on the nostalgic iconography that it promises. By the time the film does inevitably return to the Overlook Hotel, the anticipation has been mounting for almost two hours. Danny and the child psychic Abra start off on a long drive back to Colorado, the montage of scenery ominously building tension and dread. While there had been more vocal reactions to other exciting, shocking, and emotional moments of the film, the recreation of the opening flyover shot, this time in the dark, as Danny and Abra draw closer, stole the audience's breath.
Leaving the theater, I wasn't sure what to make of the film as a whole. More than anything, what stood out to me was the feeling of connection between the audience members as we experienced moments old and new, embraced new characters and spectacles, and reexperienced iconic images of a seminal American film in an engaging, new context.
Comments