Introduction:
The following is a research paper I wrote for my Humanities course this past December. The topic was creativity, and the creativity of an artist of our choice. We had to include a definition of creativity, as well as our artist's own definition of creativity, and what their own creative process looked like. We also had to choose one work of art they created, and discuss what went into making it--from the artist's inspiration to the physical creation of the work. I chose to write about Stanley Kubrick, my second favorite filmmaker of all time behind Alfred Hitchcock. In this essay, I discuss in great detail Kubrick's unique style of filmmaking, and how he applied it in the making of "The Shining" (1980). In honor of the late Mr. Kubrick's 85th birthday, I feel that this is the right time to share it on The Magic of Film. Though it is a research paper, and cannot include too many of my own opinions, it aptly expresses what I think of Kubrick as an artist, and highlights why I admire him the way I do.
Text:
What is creativity? It's a simple enough question, but the answer is the hard part because there is no one definition. One definition of creativity is "the ability to transcend traditional ideas, rules, patterns, relationships, or the like, and to create meaningful new ideas, forms, methods, interpretations, etc.; originality, progressiveness, or imagination" ("creativity"). That is ultimately what creativity is, but it still isn't that simple. Every artist has their own individual perspective on creativity, and their own creative process.
Director Stanley Kubrick is unquestionably one of the finest and most creative filmmakers in the history of cinema, and in the history of art in general ("A Life in Pictures"). Each of his films are so different in terms of subject and construction, which is a testament to his creativity ("A Life in Pictures"). He can make a powerful anti-war film such as "Paths of Glory" (1957), a lavish science fiction epic like "2001: A Space Odyssey" (1968), a humorous political satire like "Dr. Strangelove" (1964), and a profoundly disturbing horror film like "The Shining" (1980), amongst others.
Kubrick had a very distinct creative process, and always had complete control over his every aspect of his project. He was a perfectionist like no other, and was famous for filming one scene in a movie over many weeks to ensure that it was absolutely perfect. As a result of this tendency, his film shoots were very long and demanding ("A Life in Pictures"). The longest of his shoots was "Eyes Wide Shut" (1999), which went on for just under two years from late 1996 to summer 1998 ("Eyes Wide Shut"). Because it took him so long to make a film, Kubrick only made thirteen feature films over the span of his forty-five year long career as a director ("A Life in Pictures").
Just like his extended production schedules, Kubrick's films are very carefully crafted and paced, stylistically and symbolically photographed, with much of their content left to the viewer's interpretation ("A Life in Pictures"). As Kubrick states himself, "The essence of dramatic form is to let an idea come over people without it being plainly stated. When you say something directly, it's simply not as potent as it is when you allow people to discover it for themselves" (qtd. in "Kubrick").
This is applicable to almost every film Kubrick made. One of his tendencies was to stretch things out and make them as long as possible to promote the feeling of realism ("A Life in Pictures"). This style is reflected mostly in of the films from the latter half of his career, including "2001: A Space Odyssey" (1968), "A Clockwork Orange" (1971), "The Shining" (1980), and "Eyes Wide Shut" (1999). Another notable motif in Kubrick's films was his use of classical music. Notable examples of this are his uses of Johann Strauss's The Blue Danube Waltz in "2001: A Space Odyssey" (1968), extracts of Rossellini and Beethoven in "A Clockwork Orange" (1971), and pieces by Bach, Handel and Mozart as well as traditional Irish music in "Barry Lyndon" (1975) ("A Life in Pictures").
Most of what Kubrick made was so different stylistically from anything anyone had seen before. Because of this, many of his films were initially met with a mixed critical reaction. Many of his portrayals of society provoked enormous controversy, as was the case with "Paths of Glory", "Dr. Strangelove", and "A Clockwork Orange". However, as time passed, his films have come to be regarded much more favorably ("A Life in Pictures"). For instance, filmmaker Woody Allen said that he initially disliked "2001: A Space Odyssey", but came to view it as a "truly sensational film", saying "it was one of the few times in my life that I realized the artist was well ahead of me" (qtd. in "A Life in Pictures").
Stanley Kubrick was born in New York City on July 26, 1928 ("A Life in Pictures"). As a youth, Kubrick had a fascination for photography. Kubrick's family's home in New York City had a dark room, and his father encouraged him to take pictures. Kubrick launched a career for himself as a photographer for his school newspaper, and later for Look Magazine. He was always experimenting with his photography, trying to achieve photographs that would appeal to the imagination ("A Life in Pictures").
Kubrick began his career as a filmmaker by making documentaries, using his career as a still photographer as a springboard. His early work--"Fear and Desire" (1953), "Killer's Kiss" (1955), and "The Killing" (1956)--were all very artistic, and won him much acclaim in the movie industry ("A Life in Pictures"). In the late 1950s and early '60s, Kubrick's talent for making artistic, philosophical and controversial films became more and more apparent with films like "Paths of Glory" (1957), "Spartacus" (1960), and "Lolita" (1962) ("A Life in Pictures").
He became tired of working under contract, and after making "Spartacus" for Universal Pictures, he decided he would only make films that appealed to him creatively, and where he could do things his way. It was here that his perfectionist methods of filmmaking took over ("A Life in Pictures"). Though he exercised this style throughout all of his films, one of the most notorious examples of Kubrick's controlling, perfectionism was in the making of "The Shining" (1980), based on the Stephen King novel of the same name ("A Life in Pictures").
The story is about Jack Torrance, an alcoholic writer who accepts the job of caretaker for a remote hotel with a sinister history to it over the winter. He brings his wife and young son with him to the hotel. Unbeknownst to him, his son has the ability to see things before they happened. He predicts bad things will happen. Sure enough, the writer goes crazy and tries to murder his family, just as the previous caretaker had supposedly done before him.
Stanley Kubrick claimed that the novel caught his interest due to his interest in the supernatural. He thought the novel was excellent, claiming that "It seemed to strike an extraordinary balance between the psychological and the supernatural in such a way as to lead you to think that the supernatural would eventually be explained by the psychological" ("Kubrick on The Shining"). Kubrick collaborated on the screenplay with novelist Diane Johnson, and in doing so essentially re-wrote Stephen King's novel. He changed elements of the novel he felt weren't interesting, or things he felt he could make tweak to keep the audience from predicting the next part ("Kubrick on The Shining").
Kubrick himself stated that one of the novel's strengths was that it is never clear whether these are ghosts we're seeing or a projection of the writer's disturbed mental state ("Kubrick on The Shining"). For the purposes of adapting the story to the screen, Kubrick regarded The Shining as a straight up supernatural story. Jack Torrance, the writer, comes to the hotel an angry and hateful man, who loathes his family. He comes to Overlook, a place where in the past a man has murdered his family, ready to do the evil spirit of the hotel's evil bidding ("Kubrick on The Shining").
In creating the Overlook Hotel, the primary setting for the film, Kubrick had the Art Director Roy Walker travel around the United States photographing hotels. He and Kubrick would look through the photographs, and create the set of the hotel based off of them. Kubrick said he wanted the hotel to "have an authentic feel rather than like a traditional spooky movie hotel" ("Kubrick on The Shining"). For the role of the intimidating Jack Torrance, Kubrick immediately thought of Jack Nicholson. He believed Nicholson was one of the greatest actors in Hollywood, who could pull off any role. For the role of Mrs. Wendy Torrance and their young son Danny, Kubrick cast Shelley Duvall and Danny Lloyd respectively ("Kubrick on The Shining").
The filming of "The Shining" proved to be exceptionally difficult. Kubrick let his perfectionist style run unchecked and unchallenged throughout production. After filming the scene where the blood comes pouring out of the elevator, Kubrick complained that it didn't look like blood. The scene was redone three times, and took nine days to set up each time. It took about a year before the scene was done to Kubrick's satisfaction. The scene where Jack is threatening Wendy, and Wendy is backing up the stairs and swinging the bat at Jack was filmed 127 times, while the scene Mr. Hallorann explains what shining is to Danny was filmed 148 times ("Trivia").
What's worse was Kubrick's treatment of Shelley Duvall. He would be very harsh in his criticisms of her performance, and he would have her redo take after take after take till he was satisfied. Her character had to be hysterical, frightened, and desperate all the time. Kubrick pushed her harder and harder with his criticism and the many takes till she really was hysterical. When he didn't get what he wanted, he would lose his temper with her, and even accused her of wasting everybody's time. Duvall claimed that she did admire Kubrick's work ethic in retrospect, but that it was a very difficult experience for her, and one she'd never want to repeat (Vivian Kubrick).
However, Kubrick's creativity and genius are very apparent in "The Shining". His use of the Steadicam to film the actors walking through the sets of film resulted in eerie long and very smooth tracking shots. By comparison, the scenes in which a character meets an apparition are filmed and cut very abruptly. As Kubrick explained, "the paranormal visions are momentary glimpses into the past and the future, and must be short, even abrupt" ("Kubrick on The Shining").
Kubrick's crazed sense of perfection dragged the filming process over 11 dreary months from May, 1978 to April, 1979 (Trivia). "The Shining" was finally released on 23 May, 1980 ("The Shining"). As was common with most of his films, it received initially mixed reviews from film critics ("A Life in Pictures"). Variety Magazine targeted the film for distorting the novel, and that "the crazier Jack Nicholson gets, the more idiotic he looks. Shelley Duvall transforms the warm, sympathetic wife of the book into a simpering, semi-retarded hysteric" (Variety).
Among the film's negative critics was Stephen King. In a 1986 interview with American Film, King said of the film, "It's like a great big beautiful Cadillac with no motor inside, you can sit in it and you can enjoy the smell of the leather upholstery - the only thing you can't do is drive it anywhere" (King). He disliked the creative liberties Kubrick took with the story, particularly with regards to Jack Torrance, who King viewed as a good man who was fighting alcoholism, and eventually succumbs to evil because of it. In the movie however, Jack is just a bad egg from start to finish ("Trivia").
"The Shining" was completely ignored by the Academy Awards, and was even nominated for two Razzie Awards, which are like the Oscars but focus on the worst in film rather than the best. Shelley Duvall was nominated for Worst Actress, and Kubrick, in one of the most ironic miscarriages of justice in film history, was nominated for Worst Director. Luckily, both people "lost" (O'Neil). Justice was eventually dispensed, however. Contemporary critics laud "The Shining" as a very influential film in the horror genre. Film critic Roger Ebert added the film to his Great Movies series, in which he wrote, "Stanley Kubrick's cold and frightening "The Shining" challenges us to decide: Who is the reliable observer? Whose idea of events can we trust?" (Ebert).
Several filmmakers have expressed that "The Shining" had influenced or effected them. Martin Scorsese named it as the seventh scariest horror film of all time (Scorsese). Joel and Ethan Coen acknowledged the film as one of their inspirations for their film Barton Fink (1991), which is also about a writer with writer's block living in a large, eerie hotel (Levine, p. 83).
This is the journey most of Kubrick's films have been on. They are true artistic visions that spend a long time in production, and when they are finally released, People aren't quite sure what to make of them, because they hadn't seen anything quite like it before. As time passed, they grew to like his films, even to cherish them ("A Life in Pictures"). That's the type of film he made, the kind that challenged you at every turn, sometimes even besting you. Just as he pushed his actors, he pushes his audience to make sense of what he is showing us. He does this in "The Shining" by presenting us with a situation that could go one of two ways, even if he is biased towards one of them. The combination of unique aesthetics, stylistic plot structure, effective performances, and eclectic uses of music are what make Kubrick's films masterpieces, and Kubrick a great filmmaker.
"creativity." Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 10th Edition. HarperCollins Publishers. 02 Dec. 2012.
Ebert, Roger. The Shining. Great Movies, 18 June, 2006.
Web. 1 December, 2012.
"Eyes Wide Shut". IMDB.com. n.d., Web. 25 November, 2012.
"Making 'The Shining' (1980)". Dir: Vivian Kubrick. Perf: Jack Nicholson, Shelley Duvall, Stanley Kubrick, Scatman Crothers, Danny Lloyd. 1980. DVD.
Levine, Josh. The Coen Brothers: The Story of Two American Filmmakers. Toronto.
ECW Press, 2000. Print.
O'Neil, Tom (2008-02-01). "Quelle horreur! 'The Shining' was not only snubbed, it was Razzed!". Los Angeles Times. Web. 8 December, 2012.
Scorsese, Martin. "11 Scariest Horror Movies of All Time". The Daily Beast. Pub. 28 October, 2009. Web. 11 December, 2009.
"The Shining" (1980) Dir: Stanley Kubrick. Perf: Jack Nicholson, Shelley Duvall, Danny Lloyd, Scatman Crothers, Joe Turkel, Barry Nelson, and Philip Stone. Warner Bros, 1980. DVD.
"The Shining (1980): Trivia". Imdb.com. n.d., Web. 13 December, 2012.
"The Shining" Variety. Variety Staff. Pub. 31 December, 1979.
Web. 8 December, 2012.
"Stanley Kubrick". IMDB.com. n.d., Web. 23 November, 2012.
"Stanley Kubrick: A Life in Pictures". Dir: Jan Harlan. Perf: Woody Allen, Malcolm MacDowell, Martin Scorsese, Tom Cruise, etc. Warner Bros Home Video, 2001. Youtube.com.
"Cult Oddities". Stephen King. American Film. Pub: 1986.
Web. 13 December, 2012.
"Kubrick on The Shining". Interviewed by Michel Ciment. Three Interviews with Stanley Kubrick. The Kubrick Site, 1982. Web. 1 December, 2012.
