The Shining

The Shining (1980)

51 corrected entries

(19 votes)

Corrected entry: When Jack Nicholson is breaking down the bathroom door he is cutting one panel but then when he sticks his head through and says "here's Johnny," the other panel next to him is perfectly cut out even though he didn't touch it.

Correction: This is not a mistake. There is a cut between these two events, which suggests some discontinuity in time. In the first scene Jack chops through one of the panels, sticks his face through the wall and states the infamous line, and gets his hand cut as he reaches for the lock. Kubrick then cuts away to a scene of the chef approaching the hotel in his snow cat. After which Kubrick cuts back to Wendy recovering from her panic attack, we can now see that the second panel in the door has been chopped out as well. It is completely reasonable to assume that Jack may have continued chopping the second panel out while we were watching the chef approach the hotel. Jack doesn't notice the noise of the snow cat until a few moments later. Just because Kubrick didn't film and show us every progressive detail, doesn't mean it didn't happen.

Corrected entry: In the scene when Jack Nicholson goes into the Gold Room bar and orders a drink, he pulls out his wallet to pay. He then shows the bartender that he doesn't have any money. He leaves to go check on room 237 to find the crazy woman who tried to strangle Danny. He then goes back to the bar and orders another drink and now has money in his wallet.

Correction: He imagined his wallet the first time, and therefore imagined that is was empty (or the Overlook sent him that image, to show that his credit was fine and he was on good terms with "the House"). The second bar scene happens much later, after he has picked up his wallet from their room.

Twotall

Corrected entry: When Jack and his family arrive at the Overlook, the hotel manager Mr. Ullman asks Jack, "has your luggage been brought in?" and the camera shot shows a large pile of suitcases and belongings, which would definitely not have fitted in their VW Beetle.

Correction: I believe the luggage was from the final departing guests, not the Torrances.

Correction: It is Torrance's luggage indeed, you can see the tricycle too.

Corrected entry: In the scene where Wendy is confronting Jack about the bruises on Danny's neck, and she carries Danny away, take a look at "Danny" in her arms. She picks up a real little boy, but then after a cut away, in the next shot she is very obviously carrying a dummy (you can see his stiff body and cloth hand).

Correction: She is carrying a real boy the whole time - you can see Danny's thumb move while she is walking away and then once she is completely walking away, Danny's arm starts to raise.

Corrected entry: When Wendy and Danny are watching television, Danny askes her if he can go get his fire engine from his room. In that scene, the television set they are watching does not seem to have any cords or cables attached to it.

Correction: They may have figured out a way to deliberately hide the cords, or perhaps just use very very strong batteries, to end up with the image of a television running on its own with no power cord. Why? It's on the same lines as the typewriter that feeds Jack the piece of paper, the door possibly opened by ghosts - the hotel has psychic energy that makes things run and move on their own.

Corrected entry: It took Jack 60 seconds to break down the first door.. After the 17th ax swings he only has a little bit of the door chopped out and if you look closely his ax is in the center of the door panel. In the next shot they cut to inside the apartment as he finally breaks through, now it's on the left side of the door panel. (02:01:00 - 02:01:40)

????

Correction: So it takes him longer than you think it should to chop down a solid wooden door. He is drunk, or hungover, perhaps. Not a film mistake.

Corrected entry: In the French version of the movie, there is something strange. Danny is called "Doc" by his parents (Doc, Doctor, the smart one, as far as I understand, right?), which sounds like "Duck." In French, we do not have such a "Doc" expression for children and the translator used the word "Canard" which means "Duck" (I have never heard anybody call his kid "Canard," except "Mon canard"). Funny and complicated for translator's work since "Canard" and "Doc" do not have the same number of syllables. In fact, Doc is based on the Bugs Bunny Phrase "Whats up, Doc?" It shouldn't change for the French version, because its like a name or nickname.

Correction: Changing a name when translating is hardly a mistake. It was intentional and probably done because French audiences would be less familiar with Bugs Bunny.

Corrected entry: When Jack Nicholson swings the axe into the black guy's chest, it is covered in blood in the next shot (as you might expect). However, when he is chasing Danny through the maze only moments later, the axe is clean again.

Correction: There is a shot of Jack wiping off the blood on the axe.

Corrected entry: When Jack is at the bar and asks for bourbon, Lloyd pours him what is obviously Jack Daniels. Although a whiskey, Jack Daniels is not bourbon.

Correction: Federal regulators and bartenders (and presumably a layperson like Jack) do classify it as bourbon. Although JD is not produced in Bourbon County, Kentucky and therefore not authentic bourbon (it is technically Tennessee Sour Mash Whiskey), it is otherwise identical.

Federal regulations define what bourbon is. According to these regulations, bourbon must be made a certain way. Such as containing a minimum of 51% corn. Geography is not a factor. Currently there is one distillery in Bourbon County, Kentucky. Most bourbon is made in other parts of Kentucky and some is made in other states, as long as it conforms to the Federal regulations, it is bourbon.

Noman

Correction: The previous correction is correct, so I'm just adding to it. I am a bourbon drinker, but a lot of people (myself included), only distinguish whisky under two categories: rye (like Crown Royal) or bourbon (like Jim Beam). While there are other types (like sour mash), the two most recognizable are the two I just mentioned. So to say bourbon wouldn't be unusual for Jack since he most likely just wanted whiskey and would call it by the name he felt most comfortable with one the bartender would be more likely to recognize.

dewinela

Corrected entry: When Wendy goes to talk to Jack for the first time while he is working on his "book" Jack rips the paper out of the typewriter upon her entrance. He then proceeds to yell at her and rip the paper into pieces. When she leaves another piece of paper has magically appeared in the typewriter and is half way through the page. He never replaced the paper while yelling at her.

Correction: The hotel is "feeding" Jack the paper. This shows that the mansion is already controlling Jack's mind.

Corrected entry: In the baseball bat scene Wendy accidentally calls Jack Jake. Right after she says, "please, stay away, stop it Jake, get away from me". (01:48:55)

????

Correction: She never calls him by the wrong name or uses his name at all in that sequence. She says "please" in a muffed, crying scared voice. Not "Jake."

Bishop73

The Shining mistake picture

Continuity mistake: While breaking down the bathroom door with the axe, Jack repeatedly strikes and damages the right hand panel, but as he turns away from the door (when he hears the snow-cat) both left and right panels have been damaged.

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Trivia: The line "Here's Johnny" originated on the The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson, where Ed McMahon always introduced him with that phrase. Nicholson improvised the line during the shooting; Kubrick liked it and left it in.

moviedude345

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Question: Does Danny's ability to "shine" have any connection to Jack's insanity and the events that occur in the hotel?

Answer: Effectively, Danny's shining is what brings the hotel to life. Because he has such an incredibly powerful shine about him, all these weird ghost things in the hotel are able to materialize and reveal themselves. These weird ghost things are always present to some degree, and those people with a small degree of shine get glimpses of them - like Dick Hallorann. (It's not quite made clear in the movie, but Dick saw the woman in room 237 in the book). However, Danny's shine is so great that he gives these forces enough life to appear to those without any shine, people like his father and mother. As it's the hotel that's slowly driving Jack crazy, and the hotel gets its power from Danny's shining, then I'd say there's definitely a connection between Jack's insanity and Danny's abilities. In the movie, it's not as clear as it is in the book, but Jack is effectively possessed by the hotel. He's not a flawed drunk with an anger problem who loses his mind because of isolation. He's a flawed drunk with an anger problem who's doing the best he can, until the forces of the hotel get inside his head and make him lose it.

If Danny's shining is what brings the hotel back to life, does this mean that all the previous "Jacks" had a son or daughter with the shining too?

Answer: The movie is really 2 parallel story-lines with history repeating itself. In 1920s Jack visited the same hotel with his wife and son, they got stuck there due to snow storm along with rest of hotel crew (which leaves early in a hurry in 1980s). The director has carefully changed background score on things which were not present in 1920s when Dick is showing the facilities to Danny and his mother (like food cold storage). In the 80's version, Danny, Jack and Dick are the ones who have the power to shine or see scenes from the past in the same place. But as Dick says, its like reading a book and has no physical presence in current world. Whenever Dick is talking to Danny, it happened exactly the same way in 1920s, except replace the secret of shining with the secret of cannibalism around the hotel. Jack's insanity is just a repeat of his past, in the 20's the job of being the butcher (of human flesh) got to his mind and he started behaving weird. In the hotel lobby, replace the sound of heavy typing on the long table with sharp knife falling on human flesh. Red carpet depicts the blood and body parts all around the floor in 20s.

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