Review: Room 237

To properly enjoy Room 237, director Rodney Ascher's documentary exploration of oddball interpretations of Stanley Kubrick' The Shining, you have to understand one thing:

It's not really about The Shining.



Granted, Room 237's interviewees all have a lot to say about The Shining. One thinks it's a metaphor for the genocide of the Native Americans, another for the Holocaust. A third thinks it's all tied up in how Kubrick faked the moon landing footage. (No, really.) It's insane: All these different theories springing from the same (dense, detailed, fascinating) 146 minutes of film.

The idea that anyone can "figure out" The Shining is preposterous. We'll never know all of what Kubrick intended to put into the film. Some of the interviewees acknowledge that: They note that they're reading things into the film that Kubrick didn't probably intend. It's film critique as a mental exercise.

And then you have the moon landing guy, who seemed absolutely sure that his interpretation was objectively true.

To me, Room 237 is a study of eccentrics, of people's need to take insanity and make order out of it. Specifically, the intersection of that type of person (and we're all that type of person to a certain extent) and film nerds. And what better lens is there for that than Kubrick, film history's number one eccentric?

One of the parts I liked best about Room 237 was seeing how people interpret the exact same aspect of The Shining in different ways. The Gold Room is hat tip to the Gold Rush. No, it's World War II-related! And both talking heads use as evidence the fact that Kubrick, or Kubrick's people, extensively researched Colorado's history and the Holocaust. Of course he did! He's Stanley Kubrick. He researched everything!

Room 237 did change my view of The Shining. I'm now leaning toward Kubrick being an absolute troll who worked all these crazy things into The Shining to A) establish mood—nothing troll-like there, and B) fuck with people who like to read really complicated things into films.

Don't read too much into this film. Don't think you're going to have a lightning bolt moment and discover the ~secret~ of The Shining. This movie isn't that complicated. But as an exploration of eccentricity and our personal (at times maybe too personal) connection to film, it's quite fun.

Categories: reviews, Rodney Ascher, Room 237, Stanley Kubrick, The Shining