John Baumgartner

THE SHINING (1980, Kubrick)

I can’t get enough of The Shining right now – Jack Nicholson and Shelley Duvall‘s kabuki performances included – so much so that today’s shot isn’t even from the movie. I wanted to make a case study of it, so I recently read the novel, then watched the movie twice, which then led me to the fascinating wiki article on the film (click above photo for that article). All in all, I have a whole new level of appreciation and understanding of the film, if one can actually have the latter. But it was a commercial for British television’s channel 4 that has my mind blown today.

From Vivian & Stanley Kubrick’s Camera

In researching The Shining on youtube, for today’s post, I happened upon this absolutely incredible tribute to the film, in the form of a :65 ad for Channel 4’s “Kubrick Season.” There is so much crazy, loving detail in this single oner that it’s almost hard to believe – complete with behind-the-scenes beats from Vivian Kubrick’s making-of documentary: recognize the ‘bowing man’ at :41 in video below? Check out Vivian’s documentary at 3:32!

According to this brief article on the making of the promo, “The spot, which was shot over two days at London’s Bray Studios, was filmed using a 25mm Cooke lens – a favourite of Kubrick’s.” So cool. Even more so because ‘favourite’ has a ‘u’ in it.

I tell you, I would totally redrum to see a making-of of this shot!