Art House: The Shining is an unsettling Stanley Kubrick masterpiece

A writer and his family agree to spend the winter as caretakers of the Overlook Hotel. Jack Torrance (Jack Nicholson, above) has taken the position so he can work on his next book. His wife Wendy (Shelley Duvall) and son Danny (Danny Lloyd) spend their days exploring the place. Snowbound in an idyllic landscape, and ensconced in a beautiful and empty hotel in the off season, they spend the months together in solitude, connected to the outside world only by radio. And rapidly descend into a nightmare of insanity, supernatural evil and murder.

Based on Stephen King's same-titled 1977 novel, The Shining (1980) was directed and produced by Stanley Kubrick, who also co-wrote the film's script with novelist Diane Johnson. Like all of his films, it is a layered, enigmatic work whose true meaning has been hotly debated since its release.

The slaughter of Native Americans, the Holocaust, and even an apologia for Kubrick allegedly fabricating the film footage of the Apollo 11 moon landing have all been put forward as answers to what The Shining is really about. But even without delving so deep into the symbolism in the film, it still offers up an unforgettable viewing experience.

From the opening aerial shots of Montana's Glacier National Park (outtakes of which were used in Ridley Scott's Blade Runner) to one of the first uses of the Steadicam to follow young Danny riding through the hotel's hallways, the cinematography of John Alcott is an integral part of what makes The Shining such an iconic film.

Kubrick was an obsessive, relentless genius whose painstaking, compulsive attention to detail with regards to both the film's sets and the actors' delivery meant that the production schedule ballooned to more than a year. His insistence on dozens of takes drove the actors to the limits of their patience and endurance. Shelley Duvall's health suffered, offering an unwelcome layer of verisimilitude to her performance. The 70-year-old Scatman Crothers was made to do a record 148 takes of a single shot, prompting him to query: "What do you want, Mr Kubrick?"

Jack Nicholson propels the film in what many consider a signature performance. His most oft-quoted line ("Here's Johnny!") was improvised, and it is only Kubrick's unfamiliarity with American television that allowed it to remain. (It's originally the phrase used to introduce Johnny Carson on The Tonight Show.) His Jack Torrance is by turns vile, charming, menacing, and amusing.