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Even forty-five years after its release, legendary filmmaker Stanley Kubrick’s cult psychological horror movie ‘The Shining’ is still regarded as a masterpiece of modern horror. And the climactic showdown continues to haunt the viewers. But what if we tell you that The Shining might not have ended the way it did, because there was an alternative ending? What was that ending, and why couldn’t it find a place in the final version of the film? Read on to know these interesting details.
The basic plotline of The Shining follows a budding writer and recovering alcoholic, Jack Torrence (played by Jack Nicholson), who takes up the job of a winter caretaker of a secluded hotel and takes his wife (Shelley Duvall) and son (Danny Lloyd) with him. Soon after, his son (a psychic) experiences disturbing visions while Jack begins to lose his mind, and he becomes very violent. Now, the mother-son duo must find a way to save themselves from this maniac.
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The film ended with the mother-son duo somehow escaping from Jack, who loses his way in the maze and freezes to death. Then the film ended with a shot of a picture from the year 1921, where we can see Jack standing among many people during a party dance. This suggested that Jack was a reincarnated version of the man in the photograph.
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According to a report by Collider, The Shining had an alternate ending, or rather a deleted scene, which could have been placed before or after the party picture scene in the film. So, the alternate ending was that the hotel manager, Stuart Ullman (played by Barry Nelson), who hired Jack to be the caretaker of the Overlook Hotel, visits the mother-son duo at a hospital. He informs them that the cops have investigated the place, but surprisingly didn’t find Jack’s body. Before leaving, he gives the boy a familiar, ominous yellow tennis ball – the same kind that was used to lure the boy towards the creepy Room 237 earlier in the film.
This scene made the ending even more mysterious and perplexing, and viewers wondered if the hotel manager had something to do with the haunted things happening at the hotel. But, as per the report, Stanley Kubrick decided to remove this scene and keep the original ending. Apparently, he wanted to keep the ending open-ended.
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No, we think the original one is better. According to us, the alternate ending might have unnecessarily complicated the overall story and added a superfluous dimension to the film. The original ending seems simpler and more effective, and the ending worked big time, didn’t it? The fact that we are still discussing it proves just that.
Although the critical response to the film was initially mixed, the movie gained a cult following over the years. It has a Rotten Tomatoes critics’ score of 83% and a much higher audience score of 93%. The Shining has a user rating of 8.4/10 on IMDb.
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