Stephen King's The Shining

Starring:Stanley Anderson, Peter Boyles, Dan Bradley, Lou Carlucci, Rebecca De Mornay, John Durbin, Cynthia Garris, Mick Garris, Mickey Giacomazzi, Elliott Gould, Tomas Herrera, Pat Hingle, Wil Horneff, Bertha Lynn, Courtland Mead, Tim Perovich, Kenn Solomon, Melvin Van Peebles, Jan Van Sickle, Steven Weber
Director: Mick Garris
Studio: Warner Home Video
Product Type: DVD

Editorial Review:
Amazon.com
Stephen King's The Shining is a new adaptation from the author himself, made for television, that bears very little resemblance to the 1980 Stanley Kubrick version. That's not surprising since Kubrick threw out most of King's novel and presented his own version of the story. Here King redresses the balance in a miniseries that follows his original almost to the letter, and manages to be effectively creepy despite the budget and censorship limitations of the TV format.

Stephen Weber takes over the role of Jack Torrance, the caretaker who slowly descends into madness in the haunted Overlook Hotel. His performance is as far from Jack Nicholson as you could get, with his insanity building slowly and menacingly rather than being virtually mad from the get-go. Rebecca De Mornay is superb as Wendy Torrance, struggling to hold her fragile family together amid the spooky goings-on. Young Courtland Mead plays Danny, whose unique gifts give the story its title, as one of those infuriating TV brats who overacts left, right, and center. Fortunately, there are enough creepy moments and a number of frights to hold the whole thing together, the woman-in-the-bathtub scene being a standout shocker. Sure, there is nothing quite like Nicholson's "Here's Johnny!" moment, but this is the story King wanted to tell and it still shines brighter than most of the other recent screen adaptations of his work. --Jonathan Weir
Description
Jack Torrance and his family move into the sprawling, vacant Overlook Hotel to get away from it all. Away from the alcoholism that derails Jack's writing career. Away from the violent outbursts that mar Jack's past. But Jack's young son Danny knows better. He possesses a psychic gift called the shining. - a gift the hotel's vile spirits desperately want.

DVD Features:
Additional Scenes:11 additional scenes
Audio Commentary:Feature-length commentary by Stephen King, cast members Steven Weber and Cynthia Garris, Director Mick Garris and select crew
Interactive Menus
Scene Access

Stephen King's The Shining (Two Disc Special Edition)

Average customer rating:

This is the "correct" telling.
Horrible
This is a renter
A MUST SEE!!!
STEPHEN KING AT HIS BEST

Stephen King's The Shining (Two Disc Special Edition)
Starring: Stanley Anderson , Peter Boyles , Dan Bradley , Lou Carlucci , and Rebecca De Mornay
Director: Mick Garris
Manufacturer: Warner Home Video
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

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Similar Items:

The Shining
Rose Red (2pc)
Stephen King's Storm of the Century
Salem's Lot - The Miniseries
The Night Flier

ASIN: B000077VRT
Release Date: 2003-01-07

Amazon.com

Stephen King's The Shining is a new adaptation from the author himself, made for television, that bears very little resemblance to the 1980 Stanley Kubrick version. That's not surprising since Kubrick threw out most of King's novel and presented his own version of the story. Here King redresses the balance in a miniseries that follows his original almost to the letter, and manages to be effectively creepy despite the budget and censorship limitations of the TV format.

Description

Jack Torrance and his family move into the sprawling, vacant Overlook Hotel to get away from it all. Away from the alcoholism that derails Jack's writing career. Away from the violent outbursts that mar Jack's past. But Jack's young son Danny knows better. He possesses a psychic gift called the shining. - a gift the hotel's vile spirits desperately want.

Customer Reviews:

This is the "correct" telling........2007-06-29

Perfect. Not to knock Kubrick's version, but THIS is the movie based on the book.

Horrible.......2007-06-03

Bad acting, the father is never scary. The only "good" thing about this movie is that it tells the story more accurately than the first version, I cannot read books, so this movie explained the situation much better. Still, it's so boring you'll fall asleep.

This is a renter.......2007-04-02

Stephen King should stick to the printed word as every movie he's ever directed has run the gamut of mediocre to poor. The Shining falls into the mediocre pile fortunately, I guess. I know King was very critical of Stanley Kubrick's 1980 movie and so decided to redo the story to be more faithful to the book. Big mistake. Some people should write and others make movies. It's a rare individual who can do both and Steve-o isn't one of them.

This King directed mini-series has many flaws. Not least of which is the wildley inapropriate casting and bad acting. Rebecca DeMornay is tolerable as Wendy but nowhere near as powerful as Shelly Duval's Wendy from the original Kubrick movie. Duval made Wendy a bewildered character who discovers an inner strength she didn't know she had. Her Wendy experienced growth, Demornay reads her lines well. Stephen Weber as Jack is just too slight an actor to pull off the role, he's no Jack Nicholson. I kept thinking of that stupid comedy he was in about pilots on Nantucket or Martha's Vinyard, whatever. His descent into madness is indicated more by the amount of gorey makeup than character development. He doesn't have the gravitas, the presence when compared to Jack Nicholson. To be fair though he has a good scene near the end of the movie when he temporarily throws off the influence of the Overlook, but its too little too late. The worst however is the insufferable brat who plays Danny. He's so scrumdidlyumpciously cute, lisping his lines in a baby voice that to me was like nails on a blackboard. I just wanted Jack to smash his brains out with the crocket mallet and end the torture of having to listen to him whine, and he's supposed to be the sympathetic character? Few actors have made my skin crawl like this kid.

I did like the fact that the movie remains faithful to the book, but by slavishly following the book the flaws in King's narrative devices are brought into glaring relief. Some things work better on paper than translated to the screen. Kubrick, by elliminating the more supernatural happenings made a much creepier and scary movie whose tension slowly grows to a huge climax. The original movie concentrated more on the psychological tension within the characters thus making Jack's descent into madness that much scarier. King's version is much more of a typical haunted house tale that looks and feels cheesy. The ghostly inhabitants of the Overlook hotel look like rejects from a second rate zombie movie with their white pancake makeup and the effects aren't very special. The topiary animals are especially poor. The atmosphere and sense of isolation and ever mounting tension that made Stanley Kubrick's Shining a masterpiece of horror are largely absent in the miniseries. The pacing drags and it's just not very scary. Which as it's supposed to be a horror film, is a huge detriment. Overall the movie isn't horrible, it's worth one viewing, hence my title. But I much prefer Kubrick's bleak and very personal vision than Kings. I'm afraid that King should stick to writing and let masters like Kubrick make the movies even if they're unfaithful to the original material. So rent this movie if you're curious because I'm in doubt you'd want to see it more than once. I know I don't.

A MUST SEE!!!.......2007-03-20

I love the 1980's version and I know for some of you it's hard BUT it's so off the track of what Stephen King wrote. I had a lot of questions about the 1980's movie like, What was the lady in the tub all about? When Wendy is going upstairs when she looks in the one room what was the man and the man dressed up in a dog suit all about? Who were they? What were they doing? Even when I LOVE Jack Nicholson as Jack in the 80's movie and NO ONE else could've played that roll at that time, I agree with King Jack Nicholson is just scare and looks insane even when he is normal. It would've have been better to have someone play the roll that looked like a normal,sane person at the beginning and watch him turn into a mad insane killing machine!! I hate reading i can't stay focoused so this version is the closest thing i can get to besides reading the book. Yes, the new verison is long, Yes, I HATE THE ENDING TO THE BOOK AND MOVIE, it's too happy BUT.... it did help me answer a lot of questions i had about the 80's version! I love Ray Noble, he sings the song "Midnight the stars and you" that is the song playing in the ballroom and at the ending of the movie panning into the black and white picture of the july 4th ball 1921. Over all I like each of them for what they are!!! I love the shining and both versions are great in my opinion!!!The only reason i gave this one 4 instead of 5 stars was because of the ending! Check them both out!!!

STEPHEN KING AT HIS BEST.......2007-03-16

This film stays so much closer to the book than the earlier movie by Stanley Kubrick. Thanks to more modern tech, we have dissed that lame hedge maze and reinstated the chillingly lovely moving, creeping topiary hedges!!!

Also . . . big improvement by casting Steven Weber as Jack Torrance. Jack Nicholson is a great actor -- no argument there -- but let's face it. He looks like a psycho from the git-go. It is a treat to watch the hotel SLOWLY take over the mind and soul of Weber's "Jack" . . . just the way it happened in the book!

Kudos to Mr. King and the folks at ABC who let him pick up the ball and run with it.

Stephen King Thriller Collection: Dreamcatcher/The Shawshank Redemption/The Shining

Average customer rating:

pretty good box set
Great Films, slight disappointment

Stephen King Thriller Collection: Dreamcatcher/The Shawshank Redemption/The Shining
Starring: Stephen King
Manufacturer: Warner Home Video
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

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The Stephen King Collection (Pet Sematary Special Collector's Edition / The Dead Zone Special Collector's Edition / Graveyard Shift / Silver Bullet)
Stephen King DVD Collector Set (Misery / The Dark Half / Needful Things / Carrie)
Stephen King 3 Pack
Stephen King's It
Stephen King's Cat's Eye

ASIN: B000H4JH7Q
Release Date: 2006-09-12

Customer Reviews:

pretty good box set.......2006-09-27

there are only a few flaws with this boxset 1st not all the films are widescreen 2nd its a cheap boxset by that i mean the dvd boxes are the slim boxes like the friday the 13th collection i might take a pic of it and post it so you know what i mean. i hope this help you!

Great Films, slight disappointment.......2006-09-23

Good price for 3 decent Stephen King films. One catch: DREAMCATCHER is not in Widescreen so I will have to purchase a Widescreen version other than that I shall enjoy this set for years to come.

CAP

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