The Shining: Possibly The Most Horrific Horror Movie
The Shining: Possibly The Most Horrific Horror Movie
Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining is probably viewed as one of the most acclaimed horror films in US pop culture. While many view it as a gem for its disturbing ambience, intentional cinematography, and amazing performances. Sitting down and watching it in Post-modern society it feels dull, over-used, and controversially painful to watch. when thinking about the underdeveloped overused plotlines, Illegal mistreatment of Shelley Devall, and the infamous racist tropes in horror movies- this film is evil not just in content- It is clear that it perpetuates harmful stereotypes within legal framework and modern-day media.
Jacks Over-Used Underdeveloped Character
The entire keystone of the film relies on Jack Torrance’s dissent into madness. Yet his character seems be surprisingly underdeveloped. Jack’s violent acts escalate quickly with no basis of the matter other than he seems to always be a little mad at his wife. Although he does have hallucination, they are not connected to violence which give minimal psychological grounding the main character making the point of the story feel unclear and disorganized at times. This tired rhetoric of the abusive husband subconsciously perpetuates misogynistic stereotype in culture, which risks reducing complex issues of mental health to sensationalized spectacle. Jack’s actions raise questions about how insanity, isolation, alcoholism, and mental health overall is portrayed and, in a sense, stigmatized it with domestic violence when they are completely uncorrelated.
Shelley Duvall’s Mistreatment In Hollywood
Shelley Duvall, who played Wendy Torrance, was subject to extreme psychological abuse during filming many reports say including, verbal abuse, sleep deprivation, repeating horrific scenes hundreds of times, and threats to elicit genuine fear from Duvall. What was Kubrick’s version of method acting, he was the perpetrator into the decline of Shelley DuVall’s mental health. By intensifying her terror, he reflects the samemisogynistic tropes depicted in the film itself—the helpless, passive women under the control of a violent male figure. The mistreatment of Duvall demonstrates that the film’s gendered power dynamics were not limited to the narrative world; they extended into the production process.
While film sets historically were less regulated, Duvall’s experience illustrates how gendered power dynamics were normalized in Hollywood, revealing gaps between cultural practices and legal protections. Shelley Duvall’s mistreatment during The Shining is also part of a larger pattern of abuse within Hollywood, particularly against women and marginalized performers. Numerous actors have since come forward with accounts of psychological, physical, and emotional harm inflicted in the name of “art.” For example, Maria Schneider later revealed that she was not fully informed about the infamous assault scene in Last Tango in Paris (1972), a revelation that sparked widespread outrage and renewed conversations about consent on film sets. Similarly, Judy Garland endured extreme studio control, drug dependency, and emotional abuse during her time at MGM, illustrating how exploitation has long been normalized in Hollywood’s power structures.
In 1980, laws regulating psychological abuse in the workplace were far less developed than today, which allowed Kubrick’s methods to persist without formal consequences. This highlights the gap that still continues to persist between boss and employee.
Modernism VS Post Modernism: The Ending Critical Race Theory
Modernism: When watching the shining, at first glance it feels as though you are supposed to feel glad for how the movie ended. Many lovers of the movie may argue the ending was full circle, with Jack dying at the end. A lot of people feel satisfied with this ending because a tying in the hallucination with . From this perspective, the final image of Jack frozen to death can be read as a form of narrative justice, where madness is punished and normalcy is reestablished. The tying together of Jack’s hallucinations with the photograph in the hotel’s past suggests a closed loop. Everything has an explanation within the film’s internal logic. A modernist reading accepts this ambiguity as meaningful rather than troubling, interpreting the ending as confirmation that the story has reached a definitive conclusion, even if that conclusion is unsettling.
Post Modernism: The character of Dick Hallorann, the Black cook, illustrates the expendability of Black characters racialized conventions embedded in horror cinema. Hallorann’s presence is minimal until the climax. He travels a great distance to save the Torrance family, and ultimately is killed moments after arriving. His death does not advance his own narrative arc or the story at all. Instead serves to heighten storylines for the white characters giving them the happy ending, reinforcing the idea that Black lives are narratively disposable.
His death reinforces the horror trope that Black characters die first. This trope has broader social and legal significance: it reflects the marginalization of Black Americans in both cultural and institutional contexts. While Hallorann is depicted as morally upright and heroic, his expendability mirrors historical failures of the law to protect Black lives, from unequal policing to systemic disenfranchisement.
This trope persists well beyond The Shining. Films such as Night of the Living Dead (1968), Candyman (1992), Scream 2(1997), and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre franchise repeatedly position Black characters as early casualties or symbolic sacrifices. Even in more modern horror films, Black characters are often written as moral guides, comic relief, or protectors—roles that rarely allow survival or complexity. While some recent films, such as Jordan Peele’s Get Out (2017), explicitly critique these conventions, the persistence of the trope reveals how deeply racial hierarchies are embedded in genre storytelling.
Horror cinema reflects this reality by repeatedly depicting Black characters as unprotected, expendable, and ultimately powerless. This parallels historical and contemporary legal failures to protect Black lives through unequal policing, sentencing disparities, and limited access to justice. Halloran’s death thus operates not only as a narrative shock but as a cultural symbol of racial marginalization within both media and law. A postmodernist analysis is important in critiquing and dismantling these structures.
All in all, while The Shining unfortunately will always be considered a classic a critical analysis reveals a far darker legacy. Its overused and underdeveloped plotlines, combined with the illegal mistreatment of Shelley Duvall during production, and the perpetuation of racist horror tropes, demonstrate that the film is harmful not only in its content but also in its cultural and legal implications. By failing to protect women in both narrative and workplace contexts, and reinforcing racist tropes, The Shining underscores how popular media often operates within the Systemic issues built by US government and legal protections. Seen through this perspective, the film is a prime example of how it is important to address the ongoing need for legal safeguards and ethical responsibility in media production and representation.
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