A closer look at Stephen King’s famous critique of “The Shining” movie - Trinitonian
Stanley Kubrick’s “The Shining” has become nothing short of a cult classic, with the iconic, tilde-shaped eyebrows of Jack Nicholson wormed into the psyches of multiple generations. The movie has become one of the most renowned and culturally significant adaptations of one of Stephen King’s horror novels, an author with over 40 of his books adapted into either shows or movies.
Despite its widespread praise, King famously despised Kubrick’s adaptation of his book, so much so that he called it “a maddening, perverse, and disappointing film,” likening it to “a great big beautiful Cadillac with no motor inside,” eventually remaking the adaptation himself into a teleplay to finally “correct” Kubrick’s version. King has gone out of his way to vocalize his distaste for the Kubrick adaptation since its release, prompting many to speculate about any deeper-seeded, personal reasons behind his unrelenting criticism of the film.
Notably, prior to the film’s conception, King had written a script of the film for Kubrick, who turned it down, instead opting to explore his own vision of the story. Instead of King, Kubrick collaborated with writer Diane Johnson due to her expertise as a professor of Gothic novels at the University of California, Berkeley, and her contributions to The New York Times Book Review.
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