MPAA Rating: Not Rated
Director: Rodney Ascher
FilmPulse Score: 6/10
Stanley Kubrick is, arguably, one of the greatest directors in the history of cinema; his filmography is nothing more than one masterpiece after another. One of those being, his 1980 adaptation of Stephen King’s novel The Shining starring Jack Nicholson and Shelley Duvall, which many hold as a horror classic. The film follows Jack Torrance, with his wife and son, as he takes a job as an off-season caretaker at an isolated hotel. His young, psychic son is able to see the ghosts that reside at the hotel as well as the past and the future. After a snowstorm traps the family, a supernatural presence begins to have a strong effect on Jack, as he slowly descends into madness and tries to murder his wife and son.
Simple enough concept right?
Not to the five theorists that documentarian Rodney Ascher has assembled for Room 237. To these people Kubrick’s The Shining is nothing more than an elaborate allegory filled with numerous hidden meanings like – The Shining is a metaphor for the genocide of the Native Americans, or maybe a metaphor for the Holocaust. It could also be a re-telling of the Greek myth of Theseus and the Minotaur or, perhaps, The Shining is a cinematic apology from Kubrick for his involvement in creating fake footage of Apollo 11 landing on the moon. Another way of unlocking the secrets behind The Shining is to play the film simultaneously forwards and backwards, superimposed, because that is how Kubrick intended the film to be seen. There are so many possibilities!
Rodney Ascher has brought all of these theories and the people behind them together, giving them the opportunity to state their claims, all while providing the visual evidence in the form of footage from The Shining and other Kubrick films. This is where Ascher excels at making Room 237 an enjoyable and interesting documentary. The film could have easily been nothing more than a documentary filled with talking heads droning on-and-on about the hidden meanings and purported metaphors that lie within Kubrick’s cult classic. Instead, Ascher espouses the use of footage from Kubrick’s films to construct the various arguments while giving the viewer the chance to see the evidence for themselves. Not once in the entire duration of Room 237 does the viewer see the various theorists discussing their alleged allegories, all you see is the visual evidence.
The theorists included are Bill Blakemore (the Native American metaphor), Geoffrey Cocks (the Holocaust metaphor), Juli Kearns (Minotaur re-telling), John Fell Ryan (screening forwards and backwards) and Jay Weidner (Fake Moon Landing). The most thought-out and well-constructed of these hidden meanings belong to Blakemore and Cocks. Both of them discuss their respective readings with such passion and confidence that is hard not to be swayed into accepting parts of their theories. Blakemore has been discussing his theories since 1987, ever since his essay The Family of Man was first published in the San Francisco Chronicle while Cocks takes a more academic approach to his theories, which is apt given his profession (a history professor at Albion College) plus the fact that he has written a book on the matter – The Wolf at the Door: Stanley Kubrick, History, and the Holocaust. Blakemore and Cocks come off as professional Kubrick analysts, honing their theories for years while trying to perfect their various arguments, while the others come off as, how shall I put this…something else entirely.
Juli Kearns and her idea of The Shining being a re-telling of the Greek myth of the Minotaur is interesting, but it’s not that hard of a stretch to think of Kubrick adding bits and pieces of the myth given the labyrinth on the hotel grounds. However, when Kearns discusses her theory it sounds as though she’s hearing it for the first time, scanning the footage, much like the viewer, looking for clues to help build her case. At times desperately grasping for straws – case in point – a poster of a downhill skier, which she sees as a minotaur. So…there is humor in Room 237. A decent amount actually, especially when we get to the faked moon landing theory of independent filmmaker and conspiracy theorist Jay Weidner. Weidner has already discussed his theories in his own film Kubrick’s Odyssey: Secrets Hidden in the Films of Stanley Kubrick; Part One: Kubrick and Apollo which, of course, he mentions in Room 237. No, Weidner is not known for brevity. He’s so taken by his own work that at one point he won’t discuss his theory any further, instead directing the viewers to visit his film (well played Weidner). He even makes a ridiculous, far-fetched claim that the room key tag for Room #237 (which has the letters R,O,O,M, and N in capitals) can only spell two things – ROOM and MOON. Thus, solidifying the fact that Kubrick has indeed faked the moon landing – case closed. Even though he completely disregards the leftover letters in both words and when added can spell the perfect describer for his theory.
Overall, Ascher’s Room 237 is interesting and inventive look into the various interpretations of Stanley Kubrick’s horror masterpiece, that is The Shining. Room 237 demonstrates the immense power that a piece of cinema can hold over certain viewers – how a singular vision can elicit multiple viewings, dissections and analyses, all of which can vary greatly depending on one’s background and personal interests. The most undeniable achievement of Room 237 is the that the documentary cultivates such as interest in Kubrick’s film, so much so that during the film I wanted nothing more than to re-watch The Shining and develop my own theories.
