Some documentaries - called "essays" - contradict the assumption that the world can be known in a definitive way. The "essay" film shifts the focus from the end product of the investigative effort to the process by which knowledge is created. To speak metaphorically, it is the movement, not the destination, that matters the most.
Consider this as you watch Rodney Ascher's fascinating film Room 237 on Netflix. What specifically about the story - poetically or otherwise - resonated with you? Is the film dramatic? Is it poetic? One thing's for sure: Ascher's film draws attention not only to the various theories and hidden meanings in Stanley Kubrick's The Shining but goes further to reveal the subjectivity of the documentary maker and the subjective nature of knowledge and understanding itself.
I look forward to reading your answers to those questions, along with the rest of your comments by no later than 5pm next Tuesday.
Ok, when it comes to Rodney Ascher’s documentary “Room 237”, I am at an extreme bias when it comes to reviewing it. So let me get that out of the way first and foremost. I am a huge Stanley Kubrick fan. Watching 2001: A Space Odyssey was the catalyst for my love of cinema and wanting to pursue being a director of feature films, documentaries, music videos, and just about anything cinematic. He really has been a constant influence and inspiration. All of his films are masterpieces in my eyes and while not anymore, I would watch all of them voraciously in my youth. So when this movie first came out in 2012, I kind of figured I’d be enjoying in all the way through, and I did. So this is the 6th time I’ve seen this movie and through repeated viewings I think I can try to provide as much as possible, an objective criticism and analysis of this movie.
ReplyDelete“Room 237” is a movie that needs a well deserved discussion about separating the content from the craft. Not that one is especially evil, like in Leni Riefenstahl's “Triumph of the Will” or D.W. Griffith's “The Birth of A Nation”, but rather, the film is simply not well made. The interviews are barely audible at points and you’d need to be constantly adjusting the volume to hear what the people are saying but then turning it down in order to prevent from waking your roommates up while a house music version of György Ligeti’s Lontano plays towards the end. What’s especially laughable is a section of an interview where the interviewee hears his child crying and the film pauses in order to go tend to him or her. I’ve spent a lot of time looking around on the internet in interviews for any reason why Ascher kept this in, but to no avail. This has always bothered me from my first viewing because I think any sensible documentarian constructing a film entirely of audio interviews would want clarity and not this kind of silliness.
Where the actual “filmmaking” succeeds is in the editing and in the graphics. I especially love all of the graphs of where characters walk and where Danny Torrence rides his tricycle showcasing all of the architectural inconsistencies of The Overlook Hotel. The way the camera pans across them and leaves text floating about where they stay above the image looks so fucking cool and keeps me glued to the screen trying to put together all these puzzle pieces that never seem to run out at all. The way they treat the footage of Stanley Kubrick’s films is also very captivating. Like having the Zapruder film going on repeat, all these techniques like frame by frame slow motion, reversing the footage of the film, and on screen graphics, you’re thinking you’ve been brought into some crypto-ideological conspiracy anarchy group that wants to enlighten you to what has previously been out of your reach for your whole life. Whether what they’re saying is believable is another discussion for another time.
Part 2
ReplyDeleteNow, possibly the most divisive matter of the film. Should we believe what all these people say? Throughout the film, you will hear variations of this phrase, “Don’t believe me? Watch the movie.” I am sure to be watching “The Shining” again in the next couple of days because of my love of what these people are saying. Whenever “evidence” is shown for a subtext of the genocide of Jews by the Nazis, or the annihilation of the Native Americans by European settlers, or even for the most incredulous argument they present here, Stanley Kubrick helping the United States government fake the Apollo Moon landings, I just get so giddy in my seat. The idea that my favorite filmmaker had all these things in his mind while created a masterpiece not only of horror, but of the entirety of cinema in general, makes me so happy and adds so much to my ambition to be a filmmaker.
This is a film made for the fans. I think you need to have seen The Shining in order to watch this film. Netflix should really instate an algorithm that prevents people from watching this until they have seen The Shining. You may roll your eyes a stupendous amount of times, but I trust that one will nonetheless be fascinated throughout.
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ReplyDeleteI am not entirely sure where to begin with this blog post. I suppose I should start off by saying that (because The Shining is one of my favorite films) I have tried to watch Room 237 multiple times before, and was only ever able to get to the 25 minute mark because of the ludicrous, hyper-analytical, and cinematically under-informed conspiracy theories presented within it. However, after my hand was forced in its viewing by motivation of this class, I found that it was unarguably entertaining, even if its craft was questionable;
ReplyDeleteListening to conspiracy theorists has long been a pleasure of mine, as well as arguing with them. As my roommate, Sean Fahey, can attest to, I was constantly pausing Room 237 to argue against and discuss the points made in this film. This usually took the form of presenting more pragmatic and likely decisions made in the making of The Shining. For example; Sean and I had a lengthy discussion involving the supposed color-shifting typewriter where I argued that the real reason the typewriter changed from white to blue-tinged was likely a matter of optics and white balancing rather than being a replacement of said typewriter to convey subliminal messages about Nazism... or whatever the hell it was exactly that they were trying to articulate.
Now, I admit that not all of the theories presented in the film were complete hogwash, but I feel that most of them were simply an attempt to intellectualize what is a very psychologically unnerving masterpiece. It's great that the film stimulates some folks' imaginations enough to get them to think about Manifest Destiny or the Holocaust and try to tie threads. It really is a testament to the power of strong filmmaking that such thin and far-reaching threads can be drawn between the film and so many off conspiracies.
Now, to the filmmaking of Room 237 itself. To me it's really just an awkward love letter to Stanley Kubrick, and when I say awkward, I mean painfully so. For one, all the b-roll used in the film is ripped directly from not only The Shining but every other Kubrick film it seems. Even the font and style of the graphics is merely copied from The Shining, and while this is effective in a sense, it felt a bit lazy and a bit awkward. Also, what is up with the baby crying in the background? Why didn't the filmmaker rerecord the interview? I suppose I'll never know, much in the same way that no one will ever know whether Kubrick was really making a film to rid himself of guilt for faking the moon landing or how no one will ever see Stanley Kubrick's face airbrushed into the clouds after the opening credits.
This documentary was amazing to watch. I say "Kubrick's work" and not only "The Shining" since they talk about associations between The Shining and other Kubrick movies like A Clockwork Orange. I have to say, a portion of the "pieces of information" were excessively fantastical for me. Jack Nicholson's hairline was contrasted with Hitler's mustache. The words "Room No." should consequently click as "Moon Room" to the crowd? some points appeared to be perfect however! One specifically that astonished me was when Danny is playing with his toy trucks on the rug and a ball rolls to him. In the principal shot, the pattern forms a pathway open to him. In the accompanying shot, the pattern is turned around, totally shutting off his space, thats not a continuity error, its purposeful. One thing Ascher did that made the film work so well, was utilize cuts from different movies to show what the examiners were depicting. He had such a one of a kind approach on the best way to recount the story. The doc itself was practically unnerving. One of the investigators said that he turned out to be so fixated on the film that he wanted to move to a remote zone with his wife and child. Ascher conveyed a feeling to that specific scene by taking still pictures from the remote setting of The Shining and adding a shocking music to oblige it. I read somewhat more about Ascher's real perspectives of what subliminal message was in the motion picture. It was quite less particular than the Holocaust, Apollo 11, or the Genocide of Native Americans. It truly seemed that Kubrick tossed in a wide range of jokes and messages in the film. Having a red surrey smashed by a semi appear in the film can truly get a message over that it is his motion picture, and not Stephen King's. The sexual allusion was one of my undisputed top choices. The magazine demonstrated is an indistinguishable picture from a playgirl magazine that was out around then. It truly was a similar picture!
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ReplyDeleteI’ve seen this three times now, and I think I get more intrigued each time. Like they talk about Kubrick, King, NASA, and conspiracy theories...I go into geek overload. I also always find myself needing to watch The Shining afterward. For starters, I honestly cannot stand the sound in this movie at all. I feel like the music drowns out the voiceovers so much, and it becomes quite vexatious a few minutes in. (This is kind off topic, but the first time we see Tom Cruise in the film throws me off guard every time I watch it...I know it’s from Eyes Wide Shut, but idk soemthing about Tom Cruise haha) I do enjoy how they show the people in the theatre watching the film and that they did the titles in a similar fashion to the way they were in The Shining. The constant thought that goes through my head is: where do you find these people? Like the dude who literally pointed out that the red volkswagen in the car crash was like a big FU to King (as a way to showing who’s story it actually is) as the yellow volkswagen drove by it...I feel like he was onto something, but at the same time, that is a lot of thought for a single film. Then again, I feel like that’s what made this documentary. It is so focused on people’s thoughts, that it gets away with showing us a plethora of clips from the original movie. The overall focus people continuously had while watching The Shining is just incredible to me, but I think that is what makes it an essay. I do feel as though it is a poetic piece in the sense that organized chaos is able to come together to find a focus. You find the momentum that drives our minds to find a story. It allows us to dictate our own interpretation of the documentary as a singular piece from the multiple perspectives that build it up. What resonated with me is the fact that so many of these people shared the same ideas I had while watching the film. That first theory of it having to do with the genocide of Native Americans is definitely something that I thought of when I watched it The Shining for the second time. The same concept with the windows. I felt like they represented the open-mindfulness of uncanny deceit. However, when I first saw the classic horror film, I thought it was complete shit, especially in comparison with the book. This being said, I found myself paying attention to every thing in the movie, except for the characters and character development. I think this is why I began to overthink the movie so much, and it made me wonder if it was done purposely. Making the audience feel like dull boys. Personally, I’m not sure if I can agree 100% with what the interviewees had to say in this film, but I can understand the overall psychology behind why each person thought the way they did because it must have all derived from past experiences. In the core of our being, that is how humans connect with one another after all.
ReplyDeleteThe first time I saw Room 237, I think I managed to bring it up in every conversation I had with anybody over the next like 4 days. Being a narrative film director first and foremost, I fell in love with this absurdly analytical and conspiracy theory-driven documentary on one of my favorite films. After learning so much about Stanley Kubrick as a director, this doc was totally fitting for someone like him. I remember reading about how Kubrick was so obsessive with making the perfect movie that he would do hundreds of takes, abuse his actors to get them to do what he wants, and hand-place every prop and element in the frame-- timing the blocking and movement perfectly. Every single thing in every shot had to be intentional for Kubrick, which is why it is so exciting watching his films, because you can pause it and stare at a frame and know that there's a reason for every detail you're seeing! Because Kubrick has this kind of reputation, it's totally necessary to comb through a film like the shining and uncover the hidden meaning that this master director intended.
ReplyDeleteIntentionality is really the biggest thing they teach us in filmmaking-- that there SHOULD be a reason for every light, camera movement, prop, color, shape, etc that you place in front of the camera. Everything should should contribute to a greater meaning and serve the themes of your story. So, Kubrick is really just the "perfect" example of that idea... perhaps taken a little to the extreme. Now, were all of these theories correct or worth exploring? I don't think so. Maybe the inconsistent map/floor plan of the hotel didn't make sense simply because it was overlooked by the designers, or maybe they chose the aesthetic choice of having a window in that office as opposed to the logical choice of leaving it out because of its location. Maybe they thought nobody would notice, and that it served the story better. I believe they are plenty of things like this where the filmmakers intentionally chose "art" over "logic" or they were just coincidences. Anything can be linked to any other thing in some way if you look at it hard enough or from enough different angles, which the theorists in this doc did plenty of. At the same time, there were also so many legitimate observations, like WHY ELSE would a set decorator/prop master remove or add a single Dopey sticker to the door? What could possibly be the reasons except that it was a specific and intentional ever-so-subtle detail that Kubrick ordered just for the sake of adding to the richness of the movie?
Overall, I think the fact that this documentary exists is truly a testament to Kubrick's genius ability to create a film that can stand the test of time and keep people watching it and talking about it for years to come. I could only dream of gaining the reputation of being such an insightful director that people would even consider looking into my films as much as they did here.
Trina Mulligan
ReplyDeleteHonestly, I couldn’t finish watching this “documentary” because it was extremely ridiculous. I think Ascher could have done a better job at making a more engaging and interesting film. This reminded me too much of a crazy conspiracy theory video on Youtube more than an informative documentary. There were a few points that actually made sense such as the genocide of Native Americans and the placement of the Calumet cans in the storage area. However, I think the whole idea about the Apollo footage was confusing and too vague to be an interesting enough theory.
I believe this documentary achieved its purpose in the sense that it showed the perspectives of different people who all see the same film and how it affects each of them differently. Sadly, nothing about this film resonated with me or captured my attention. If anything, it made me want to rewatch The Shining to come up with better theories than the interviewees! I also was not a huge fan of the continuous montage shots over the theories. Some of the shots were repeated multiple times throughout and were slowed down to such a slow pace that I got anxious and wanted to fast forward to get to the important or main ideas. I love the idea about conspiracy theories, but if they’re stupid, I find them unimportant.
If I got one good thing out of this film, it’s that as a future cinematographer or director, I will definitely spend my time on placement of objects to create hidden messages and metaphors. I think some of the best films are the ones that have a completely different meaning when you look from a different perspective or ask why the director chose to do something that he/she did.
To start off, I consider myself a fan of Stanley Kubrick. I've seen The Shining several times and I love how his films make you think, and how fantastic they are from a filmmakers perspective. However, I could barely get through this documentary. The people in it were fanatical weirdos bursting with off the wall conspiracy theories. Throughout the film, I felt a mixture of frustration and amusement, particularly with the Apollo landings guy. It was interesting to see how each person twisted the film to back up the meanings they made up for it. They would nitpick and grasp at straws just to prove their theory, when many of those things may have just been by chance. I'm still on the fence about how the documentary was made. On the one hand, the audio was poor quality. On the other, the audio over the footage made the film feel like a video essay made by fans, which it sort of was. The way the people spoke, with that one guy walking away to quiet his kid, made the film more raw and handmade. Underneath all of the conspiracies and minutiae, the documentary was essentially a love letter to Stanley Kubrick. These people loved his films, The Shining specifically, and watched it so many times that they picked up on the background pieces and built their own meanings. Kubrick once said," I would not think of quarreling with your interpretation nor offering any other, as I have found it always the best policy to allow the film to speak for itself.” These people, crazy as they are, have valid opinions and have used this doc as a platform to express how Kubrick's film made them feel. It was a decent documentary.
ReplyDeleteWhat resonated with me most about Room 237? Probably the fact that I learned it was physically possible for me to eye roll through an entire film. I’ve seen YouTube videos about The Shining that are better than this. This “documentary” should never have been more than a YouTube video!
ReplyDeleteOkay listen, I LOVE conspiracy theories and overanalyzing things but that shit belongs on YouTube or in a podcast or something. Especially since most of what these people were talking about was complete bullshit. The only time I would want to watch an actual documentary about the secrets of any film would be if it were done by the creators of said film. I guess that’s personal preference but there’s something that doesn’t sit right with me when I see these randos feel like they have the authority to put out an official documentary about The Shining. Kubrick isn’t even alive to defend himself.
There’s no doubt that Kubrick puts so much thought into every frame of his films and he definitely has hidden messages… but if you have to completely manipulate his work to prove your point, you are reaching. If a person wants to believe something, they will find/create evidence to support it- even if they have to overlay the entire movie backwards on top of itself.
It’s frustrating because at times, these people were really onto something, but then they took it back to the fake moon landing or Nazis or something and I was over it. I’m a big fan of The Shining and was really looking forward to liking Room 237 but in the end it just pissed me off.
Sure this doc definitely shows the power behind Kubrick’s skillful crafting of The Shining. His film was layered and cryptic enough to breed the most absurd conspiracy theories. That’s kind of cool! As for the actual construction of this video essay, it’s pretty amateurish. Once again, I believe this should have been presented on a platform like YouTube.
Room 237 was super annoying but I guess it was interesting to hear other people’s perspectives on an awesome movie.
First off, thank you Dan for saying it was okay for me to do a video blog for this doc.
ReplyDeleteHere's the link. https://youtu.be/ztpW4wgYdNI
I literally watched this doc and then sat down and recorded my raw reaction. I apologize if my thoughts are scattered, I edited it as best I could.
Though the word “boring” comes to mind when I think of essay style documentaries, I’ve realized that they’re probably my most-watched type of video on YouTube. I’ve seen analytical video essays and documentaries all the time, so how different could Room 237 be?
ReplyDeleteRoom 237’s faults mostly lied in issues to do with its length, and this made me feel like the editors were grasping for straws with content by the forty minute mark. At least, that’s when I stopped being entertained- which makes me sad. I was actually glued to the screen and making a “Hm.” noise every few minutes until it got dry. Upon first hearing about The Shining’s possible theme connections to Native American genocide, I was just starting to be hooked in this obscure, pseudo-conspiracy. And when I heard the following points about how The Shining could possibly be about the Holocaust- my socks were blown off, and I was completely sold.
But then, it leapt onto some other speculation. Something about the film containing subliminal messages about sex? Then, mythology? Then the Holocaust- THEN 2001: A Space Odyssey. Then it probably went back to Native American genocide once or twice.
My point is that the organization of this film was unsightly. The supposed “nine chapters” didn’t do jack for this essay’s comprehensibility. I would kill for the same film, but if it were just organized in a way that went theory by theory. Not to mention, the scattered interviews and eventual lack of subject name subtitles made it hard to remember who was who. I guess I could edit the audio of Room 237 to whatever story structure I’d like on my own. All the B-roll footage was ripped from other films, anyways.
Even still, the lack of talking heads in this doc didn’t bother me one bit. Though almost none of the screen content shown was entirely original work, I still appreciate that I could be provided with visual examples of the “evidence” when the narration called for it.
As mentioned earlier, only two points mentioned at the film’s beginning were really mind-blowing to me. The deeper the stories got, however, the less I believed it. At least an hour’s worth of the film’s proposed theories began to feel exaggerated, which made me want it to hurry up and end. I found myself wishing that everything was paraphrased and then crammed into a thirty minute short YouTube feature so that the audience only has to listen to the best bits. Perhaps I just have a weak attention span.
My final verdict is that Room 237 needs to calm down, shorten up, shave off those weaker pieces of thematic Kubrick evidence, organize interview by interview, and maybe quit reusing that shot of the back of a movie theater audience with The Shining’s opening helicopter shot playing on the projector. You know the one.
Ian Roozrokh
ReplyDeleteWell. Holy Shit. I’m both blown away and also questioning many aspects of the choices and points this documentary was set to tell. First of all Kubrick is one biggest inspirations when it comes to creative writing and narrative storytelling. The Shining was the first Kubrick film I watched, first watching it when I was around nine years old, and since then I’ve rewatched it around 7 to 10 times.
As the documentary pointed out, all of Kubrick’s films end with a puzzle and that was exactly how I felt each time I finished any of his films, especially The Shining. The documentary really hit me in the face with the underlying meaning of the film and it kept my jaw wide open for a good portion of the film. I understood where each point was coming from and I believed most of them because they supported them with evidence and authenticity. Some points made seemed to be churlish and desperate on the idea of connecting and relating anything and everything, which in some case may be true, but still none of these words are actually Kubrick’s so the believability is someone hard to grasp.
Stylistically I enjoyed it. Having the interviewees not have any screen time I found to be very effective and kept me entranced and thoughtful of the goals of the film.
Overall, I want to keep rewatching the film and rewatching this documentary and hope to connect even more dots. I find such an inspiration to incorporate history and The past into my work as well because I find that very, very important.
I am actually quite bummed because I am not very knowledgeable with Stanley Kubrick’s work. I was aware of most of the films he had made, however, I haven’t seen any of them. I knew I wasn’t going to watch “Room 237” without seeing “The Shining” because I knew I wouldn’t understand the documentary. One of the reasons I hadn’t seen “The Shining” is because I grew up with a very conservative father that would NEVER let me watch scary movies, as they were, in his words, “evil”. Haha. I was sheltered as a child with films, it’s ridiculous. I would re-watch Disney movies over and over again…and I didn’t know any better. It’s instances like this where I wished I would have been pushed to watch more classic films that I was never exposed to.
ReplyDeleteAscher’s “Room 237” was really intriguing. I had just watched The Shining for the first time, and I thought it was weird as hell, in a good way. I think with my background, it was a lot easier to believe the theories the filmmaker presented in the documentary, because I had little knowledge of Kubrick’s intentions in his work. What I do know is, that he did go into great detail when producing his films. Everything should mean something, which is totally respectable and fascinating. It is possible for anyone to believe certain theories if there’s enough evidence provided. The people that were interviewed were obviously fans that analyzed Kubrick’s work quite in depth, however, there is a sort of subjectivity with that. How can a person like me, someone who is unfamiliar with Kubrick’s work, really trust these people?
Though the film utilizes about 98% of footage from Kubrick films, which is really the only b-roll that would make sense in this essay style documentary; I think it’s completely necessary. The frame by frame playback is what made the theories so believable to me, because the explanations were so well thought out. The connections to the Native American Genocide and Holocaust could very well be true, but such things like faking the Apollo moon landings and the changing colors of the typewriter just seem silly. One of the ideas I agreed with and that resonated with me was the scene where Danny is playing with his trucks in the hallway and the path for the ball encloses in the second shot; that had to of been planned. The idea that the set was purposely supposed to mess with your mind was one of my favorites, because it did. It’s obvious that Kubrick spent the time to mess with the viewer, creating levels of the hotel that weren’t actually there. The film does a great job of explaining this with the visual diagrams of the floor plan of the hotel/rooms.
I thought the film was dramatic because as a viewer, I didn’t know if these theories were true, but they could be possible. I was kept on the edge of my seat for most of it. Maybe it’s because I literally just watched The Shining? I don’t know. Aesthetically, I think this film was pretty boring, but I don’t think it was meant to be stylistically pleasing anyway. It’s an essay-style film…which can have certain styles but don’t necessarily have to. For a film that requires evidence, I really don’t think they could have made it any other way. Now, the lack of talking heads didn’t bother me really, but afterwards I actually did wonder what background these interviewee’s came from. Were they just film fanatics? What was their profession? Were they obsessive researchers of genocide, or space travel? Stuff like that makes me feel like this film is more subjective than I thought at first. This film isn’t poetic to me. If I were ever to make this documentary, I probably would have tried to think of a more creative way to make the film, instead of basically just copying the style of “The Shining”, like the inclusion of the turquoise typeface and repetition of clips from other Kubrick films.
The film did present new ideas to think about while watching the film. I now think that I will find myself looking deeper into fiction films and their meanings. This film was effective as an essay style documentary, I think.
I’d like to begin this by saying that I am rather embarrassed by how much excitement I broadcasted when Dan announced this was our assigned doc for the week. I remember being completely fucked up over Room 237 the first time I saw it when it came out.
ReplyDeleteI’m a huge fan of conspiracy; if you get me drunk enough I will absolutely not shut up about the moon landing being fake, Paul McCartney being dead and replaced, and 9/11 being not what it seems. I’ll pretend I’m saying it ironically, but no one buys my irony. But after my second viewing of this I found myself groaning and rolling my eyes so far into the back of my head that I could see into my own cranium.
I had somewhat of a realization after the music drastically raised my heart rate that, as focused as this documentary was on the specific theories themselves, they were just a tool to illustrate what many of the interviewees prefaced with – The Shining is a movie that is supposed to make you think. It isn’t trying to make the audience prescribe to any one of the theories because they all get equal screen time. It’s showing us how much material Kubrick puts into his films to seemingly fuck with the minds of his audience.
The Shining is more than a horror movie. We have always known that. When I have watched it myself, over and over I am grabbing at air getting hints of more going on, not quite grappling WHAT I was trying to get. The casual audiences of The Shining might get hints too, but being a cinema fan I am always on high guard for things of the sort. This documentary kind of appeals more to the casual audience than the cinema one because it IS so ridiculous.
But that’s the point. It’s just an extremely dramatic illustration of the magnitude of what is within the realm of possibility with Kubrick.
While the audio is at most times brutal to sit through, Ascher’s fascinating use of B-roll almost entirely conjured from other films alludes to Room 237 being about The Shining specifically, but broadly about cinema. There’s more to a movie than just entertainment. It’s probably an extremely unpopular opinion, but I strongly feel this was made with cinephiles in mind and made by them too. While it mostly just pisses them off, they’re trying to open the for casual movie viewers to understand what is the draw for so many people. I don’t know exactly how well they do it, but I at least understood it wasn’t the specifics that got the job done, but the broader blueprint for loving cinema.
Okay, so when it comes to The Shining, I am extremely biased. I absolutely love the shining it is one of my all time favorite movies, and I think it is an absolute masterpiece of film making, along with other Kubrick films. Originally, I thought I didn't like these types of documentaries. I thought they were boring. Maybe I just wasn't watching the right ones. This doc kept me focused and captured in the narrative. One thing about this style that I really enjoyed was that it kept the identities of the interviewees a secret. We don't know who they are or what their merits are. They could be professional movie critics or shut ins who live in their mothers basement still at 40 years old. It gives each theory the same standing so you can believe or not believe any of them without having any influence. However this film does require you to have knowledge of Kubricks other works in order to get the full narrative. Other than that, the film is entertaining and well made.
ReplyDeleteAs a avid Stanley Kubrick fan boy, and a huge fan of The Shining I was extremely happy to see this as the next doc we had to watch outside of class. Before I had seen this documentary about the film I had written a few papers about The Shining (book and film). So I have a pretty decent understanding of this topic. I think it really helps to have read Stephen Kings novel as well as it is the original story. However the documentary is mostly about the work of the late Genius Stanley Kubrick. I was quite saddened to see some of my fellow classmates saying they thought The Shining was sort of a sham or that they refuse to watch the film. I understand that some people have their opinions, but seriously.. It’s Stanley Kubrick there is a lot to learn from such a filmmaker.
ReplyDeleteAnyway, I love this documentary… I think its one of the best sort of video essay style docs I've ever seen. I love how you never see any new footage really. It’s all from the shining and explains details of the moon landing that has always been rumored to be staged. I think as of recently there was more news on that. My favorite detail that was mentioned in the film was the color of the Volkswagen Beetles. The fact that Kubrick changed the colors and had the red bug flipped over in a car accident was such a cool detail that slipped by me. There are people who think that this might be reading into the film too much, but I doubt it. Stanley Kubrick is a maniac when it comes to detail and some how I doubt that he did anything on accident. From the native American artwork to the decals on Danny’s door. These were all conscious decisions made in pre production. I mean you cant ignore the fact that Danny was wearing a sweater with the Apollo spaceship on it, and you cant tell me that it was not some kind of sign.
I love this film, and I love how it keeps your attention without showing you anything new, and without showing you the narraters faces. I think the detail, and shock factors are what kept this film interesting though out the entirety of its playing time.
Zoey Danielson
ReplyDeleteRoom 237 was definitely something. I couldn't really get through it, I had to push myself to keep watching because after the (what seemed like) 200th theory, it began to get a little repetitive. I like Stanley Kubrick, but not nearly as much as the people in this film. If someone were to create one of these on The Shawshank Redemption, I would be ALL. OVER. IT. But alas, it was not.
This film in the beginning was interesting to watch. I appreciate everyones theories and especially how everyone came upon these theories. But like I said before, it began to get super repetitive. I think if Ascher would have switched up the way he presented these theories, with something new for each person, it would have been more engaging. I began to imagine these people trapped inside rooms, with no light shining through and millions of pieces of paper taped up on their walls, all connected by red string and them going absolutely mad, running their fingers through their hair, trying to explain their theories. It almost became comical in a way. Especially the minotaur lady. I enjoyed it at first and then it was just too much.
That being said, what I did love about it, was the obvious passion these people had for film. That, to me, is a very relatable topic. I've certainly gone mad with ideas about films before, not as mad as they did, but close. I like how these people were able to create something out of the smallest thing, posters, cans, tricycle rides, etc. That is something I really appreciate and admire, imagination is essential to life and I don't think there is enough of it anymore. Overall I really truly appreciate this collage of film for what it was, it just wasn't for me.
I’m going to start out by saying I didn't really like this film. From the start I was pretty bored with it. I was confused by the lack of quality with the audio and also wasn't quite sure who these people were presenting the theories. I had no idea if their opinions were even credible which made me question their accountability. I then went on to question why this movie was even on Netflix.
ReplyDeleteOne part of the story that resonated with me was the theory that Stanley Kubrick played tricks on the audience and pushed their acceptance of visual information presented within different scenes. One scene in particular was at 15:20 when the fact that the television has no cord is brought to light. Its pushing the audience's understanding of the tv because there is no natural way that the tv could be turned on without a cord.
I think the film is dramatic through the use of score. I felt like there was a mix of mysterious and intense music played throughout the entire 1 hour and 43 minutes of the film. I didn't get a poetic tone from this film. The information was very straight forward and backed up its theories with the usage of supporting footage from the Shining and other clips which I am not exactly sure where they came from. I will go on to say that the film met the purpose of explaining and presenting the information. It made me want to watch The Shining over again (which I did) to see if any of these theories really could be true. I found it irksome that these people felt as if they had Stanley Kubrick all figured out. I wish he was here to accept or deny these ideas but unfortunately we will never know the true meaning behind the film.
So, I’ve never seen a Kubrick film before, and I think watching this film spoiled a pretty damn good movie. As a film student of any kind in any capacity you can always find yourself confronted by a Kubrick film and deciphering it frame by frame. For an editing class It would probably be that match cut from 2001: A Space Odyssey, for an in-depth look at film analysis and character creation, it may be the entirety of A Clockwork Orange, or if you’re a cinematographer you’d look at Kubrick’s own grid (not the rule of thirds or the golden ratio) where all lines in a scene lead to a center and all lines are equally related yet symmetrical to each other.
ReplyDeleteI had a problem with the “authority” of this movie; not in the sense of their credentials lacking any gravity, but rather the way they spoke and presented themselves reminded me of an angst ridden teenage kid trying to convince me that 9/11 was an inside job. I have no doubt that it was, but let someone who can present the facts better explain it to me. It’s not that this film maker should have spoken with the power of, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr, or Obama, or have the cohesiveness of Dr. Paul Ekman, or the poetry of Alan Watts... But the voice of the main narrator reminded me of a twenty something year old who got too baked and tried desperately to manage his ideas cohesively. I’m not discrediting his information, but I will say that he may have needed a few or more classes on oration. The reason I’m commenting on this element is because most of the time I had this slightly hostile attitude towards the filmmaker. I kept thinking, ‘This is your opinion, one of many, and you’ll be an authority only if I buy into it.’ I’ve watched Youtube Videos on the same topic done better and are more engaging. Especially with The Dark Knight, I watched video after video much in the same way this documentary is set up, and ended up watching an hour and a half of people explaining abstractions to me in a more entertaining fashion.
I don’t know who was talking and I don’t care.
I was Pleasantly surprised when the filmmaker made an unbelievably monumental claim about the past. While talking about the idea of illusions playing a major role in this film, he said history is an illusion because it doesn’t exist, the only place it exists is in the moment of now. I strongly agree with that idea, in fact so much so that I would say that not only is the past an illusion, but so is the future. “yesterdays the past, tomorrow’s the future, but today is a gift, that’s why it’s called the present”
So while I really like this doc, and its content, I also had my problems with it. Don't get me wrong, I love conspiracy theory videos, and this doc came off to me as a huge conspiracy theory doc for The Shining. While the content was really interesting, even though some of the stuff is sort of a stretch to me, the visuals were just really boring. The constant slow motion of the scenes from the movie just made my eyes heavy.
ReplyDeleteBut regardless of the visual style, I feel it was necessary to the film's way of story telling. I also applaud the people on noticing these trends and messages in The Shining, and finding meaning in it, whether or not they have any basis in truth. For me the coolest thing this film did visually was juxtaposing The Shining with other films and things, my favorite being Jack Nicholson falling down the stairs and the other dude falling down the stairs to the temple place. I definitely feel that scenes like this refreshed my eyes in a way, and allowed me to continue watching while still being interested, but it was kind of an annoying cycle that needed to take place just to keep me interested in an intriguing topic.
I always steered away from scary films, so this weeks assignment was a challenge to complete. I first watched The Shining (which was always a classic film I knew I needed to see, but just never happened until now) and then watched Room 237. I 237 was a well done documentary; it was interesting and complex that kept my attention throughout. I think the biggest aspect to it was the fact of how there was little secrets to be discovered in Kubrick's work that I didn't know beforehand.
ReplyDeleteSean McGann
ReplyDeleteSo The Shining is my fourth favorite movie of all time. Stanley Kubrick is my favorite director of all time and the guy who made me want to become a director. I had heard from film reviewer Brian Lewis of Midnight Screenings that Room 237 was a movie where "crazy people say crazy shit." So I went into this film with low expectations.
After watching the film, I was surprised to find that I was completely in the right to have low expectations.
From an editing standpoint, this film needs a lot of work. There's one scene where the infant son of a interviewee is crying in the background. The interviewee decides to get up, put down his microphone, and go to calm his son down. They left a giant outtake that completely takes you out of the movie. It'd be one thing if this were a talking head interview, but this is all in voice-over, making it all the more disorienting. Several interviewers as they try to come up with fringe theories off the top of their heads stutter, stammer, and make blunders. The editors of this film don't even bother paying attention to the interviews, paying closer attention to chroma keying and masking footage of The Shining on TV screens that at times looks seamless, but more often than not looks fake and cheesy. The audio interviews run stale with the constant "ums" and "uhs" and "you knows;" a good editor would not keep giant blunders in. If they wanted their conspiracy nuts to sound convincing, they should've edited them to sound more professional. A good director would ask the interviewee taking care of his infant to do another take. These mistakes make the film feel less theatrical and more like something that would get 600,000 views or less on YouTube.
The score for the film doesn't help. The score was so cheap-sounding, it felt like the editors just used placeholder music from Kevin MacLeod or Epidemic Music, and forgot to take it out. My roommate makes hip-hop beats, and will often practice using the synth sounding on his keyboard. The whole score for Room 237 sounds like that; it sounds like someone practicing on the synth without rhyme or reason. Instead of giving an atmosphere of intrigue or creepiness, you instead feel like you're watching a rejected History Channel program.
On a technical level, the documentary is lackluster, and feels more like a half-assed assembly cut than a final cut released in theatres to be watched by paying customers. But what about the ever-so mind-blowing revelations about Kubrick's genius subliminal messaging and directing choices?
End of Part 1
Sean McGann
ReplyDeletePart 2
I watched Man on the Moon, a loose biography about the life of Andy Kaufman, the day before I watched Room 237. Interestingly, the film opens with Kauman stating that the film is "terrible" because aspects and facts of his life have been changed around "for dramatic purposes." This was made because the screenwriters knew that Kaufman fans would nitpick about the inaccuracies, and wanted to acknowledge the fault before the audience could and relinquish responsibility for using artistic license.
Room 237 begins similarly, with a message from the filmmakers saying they do not believe in any of the brainless goop that the disembodied voices are talking about. This is to make the filmmakers not seem at fault for the opinions of the film's interviewees. Basically, they know that the following events are full of shit, much like Kaufman, and don't want to take responsibility for it being full of shit. (side note: Man on the Moon is more of a fact-based documentary than Room 237)
About half of the conspiracies aren't even conspiracies. Most of the subjects just ramble on with no real point they're trying to make, grasping at straws before those straws spontaneously combust from the sheer amount of lunacy. For example, someone tries to argue that Danny is the one killing his father, Jack. Their evidence? Background details in the Big Wheel scenes that show where Danny is in the hotel. This apparently implies he's looking down on his parents because he's upstairs and they're downstairs. Okay, that makes no sense, but it also doesn't have relevancy to the argument that Jack is killing his father. And that's one of the more sensible ramblings!
Often times, the conspiracy theorists make up visuals in The Shining that aren't there. I mean, at least when Alex Jones said that contaminated water was turning "the friggin' frogs gay," there was actual contaminated water. An old man says that there's an image of Stanley Kubrick's face in the clouds at the beginning of the film. I can't see it. He says I have to look close to see it. I still can't see it. He then says he'll need Photoshop to properly show it, and that you'll just have to trust him. He never does and I don't. One lady tries to cover up the film's error of a skiing poster in the games room, despite Mr. Ullman saying that the Overlook's area is bad for skiing. She argues that the poster is not of a man skiing (despite the word "SKI" in the lower-left corner of the poster). It's actually... a minotaur! Yes, a minotaur. The poster's figure of a man looks absolutely nothing like a minotaur in any way, shape, or form, but it's totes a minotaur, people! But what about the skis the man is wearing? Well, she argues it's just a "suggestion" of skis. You hear that? It's all an illusion! There's no skis, only a suggestion. There are four legs, not two. There are five lights, not four.
I haven't even gotten to the lunar conspiracy yet. It takes the film fifty-four damn minutes to get around to it, but it's worthy of its own post.
End of Part Two
Sean McGann
ReplyDeletePart Three
Honestly, the only conspiracy theory that had any real believability to it was the metaphor about Native American genocide. While some of the proof they give is grasping at straws, there's enough presented to where the metaphor could easily be a video by PBS Idea Channel.
The lunar theories are horse manure of the most putrid kind.
Arguing this and that about how the reason Room 217 was changed to Room 237 was because the moon landing was on "Soundstage 237" rings of dishonesty. The reason given was that the hotel the Overlook was based on has a real Room 217. The interviewee says the hotel never had a Room 217 because "he called them. Does he not remember that the book The Shining was just as popular as the book the film is barely based on?
One thing that really pissed me off as a huge fan of Kubrick was how much people lied about Kubrick. Several interviewees say that Kubrick saw this movie as a kid or read this book while writing the screenplay with such certainty, despite never showing any proof that this happened. They just say that this is what happened, no doubt about it. They're making up stories about Kubrick and acting like they know everything that Kubrick was thinking of, all while saying that he was a genius. I'm not arguing that Kubrick wasn't a genius. I'm just saying that it's offensive to me to make up things about him when trying to make your pathetic conspiracies sound plausible. If you want to make your conspiracy not easily debunked, rely on facts and observations, not a hunch that Kubrick saw The Three Little Pigs as a kid. If he did, say that "Kubrick said in an interview that he saw this film." Do not, I repeat, do not say "Kubrick saw this film as a kid, now here's some Holocaust metaphors." You're outright lying to your audience. I mean, you always were, but now you're not even trying.
Overall, this was a waste of my time. I went into it knowing that I would disagree with the conspiracies, but I thought that I would pay attention to the creative way that the techniques of documentary filmmaking are used to create their worldview. Instead, I was given a barely finished, barely competent YouTube video that was too long and too lame for my enjoyment. It takes nonexistent evidence and tries to gaslight you into seeing that that does not exist. It rambles on trying to make a point and instead just zooming in on random parts of a shot and churning out an explanation about a metaphor for the CIA killing Elvis or some other nonsensical train of thought. I expected an interesting take on a terrific movie, but instead I got insane mutterings that were somehow connected to a terrific movie.
There is nothing in Room 237, so stay out.
The End
I don't know what to say. The style of this doc was the only interesting thing about it. Then again, I couldn't stomach more than 40 minutes of it. Partially because of the situation I'm having to deal with, but mostly because there wasn't any sort of rhythm or pace to the film as far as I could tell. This fact alone made me want to ask the nurses for my fiancé's pain meds in hopes they would miraculously make this worth watching. Unfortunately, I don't think that's legal, so the film remained dramatically dull.
ReplyDeleteI did laugh when one of the narrators kid was screaming in the background and he stopped to "try to calm him down". That, to me, was the most real part of this doc. It was relatable in the sense that while we work, there is always something to distract us. I thought it was really honest and raw, and I am glad the editors kept that in the film.
From what I did see, (and I will do my best to finish watching before I attempt to skype into class) like I said before, there wasn't really any particular order or rhythm to the theories. They seemed to just continue one right after the other, which seemed a little monotonous. So far, it was missing something really catchy for me, and (regardless of the fact that he's on pain meds) it put my fiancé to sleep within the first 15 minutes!
Also, I have only seen the Shining once, and I wasn't a fan. I don't think it was the film itself that I didn't like, but Jack Nicholson's character. There's just something about him that rubs me the wrong way, so any film he's in just seems like the same old thing.
DeleteI prefer to see "Room 237" as a documentary about several peoples' passion for The Shining and how their passions almost turn to a form of obsession when it comes to their theories. Seeing it as a documentary actually about the theories themselves is just sort of frustrating for me.
ReplyDeleteThere's no sense of authority with any of the interviewees, so while their theories are certainly creative and seemingly well-thought out, they just come across as convoluted and reaching. The thing I appreciated the most is the attention the filmmakers put into assisting the explanations of the theories using animated maps and other graphics. They really showed respect for the ideas being put forward, no matter how crazy they were.
I am sorry to say that this was my least favorite film we have watched thus far. I watched it twice thinking maybe I wasn't paying close enough attention to the film but I still really didn't like it. The lack of talking heads really bugged me about this film. The B-roll annoyed me, because it was mostly footage from other films. In addition the whole idea of the film is just not interesting to me at all. I really don't like scary movies, therefore I have never seen the Shining. To be completely honest after watching this film I don’t want to watch the Shining at all. I felt that all the conspiracies about the hidden messages in the film didn’t really make any sense to me. I understand that everyone is entitled to their opinion about what they felt the film was about but some people was just reaching. Like the idea that the movie is about the landing or not landing on the moon. My personal favorite conspiracy theory presented in the film because of its absurdity is the idea that the Calumet baking powder cans represented the genocide of the American Indians. Also the whole map or the hotel was pretty interesting but not my favorite part of the film either. I won’t say that I hate this film but it’s not something I would want to watch a third time. I guess I would fill differently if I would have seen the Shining or was like a Stephen King fan.I did find the whole showing the film forwards and backwards thing to be pretty interesting. I would have never thought to mirror a film that way. I would have to admit, it was pretty cool and a little creepy.
ReplyDeleteAlright i’m just gonna say this right off the bat. This is about the tenth time I have seen this doc and I still stand by that the majority of theories in this doc are bull. Especially the minotaur one. The figure in the poster didn’t even have any got damn horns! I can’t really put a finger on what exactly resonated with me with the film, but I can feel something there if that makes sense. I would definitely say that this film is dramatic just in the overall tone in it, and it is definitely poetic as well for the way it was made. Like the way it shows movie clips instead of talking heads is really cool and I personally love it. Going into the conspiracy theories of the film, I would just like to say I’m not 100% sure on all of them, I think they are very long shots for the most part. That being said I do think there is something weird that was happening in the background of the film. Mainly through the layout of the hotel. I agree with the people in the movie that someone like Kubrick wouldn’t be lazy with the continuity of his set and even scenes in the movie. But something just literally dawned on me as I am typing this and it might seem a little stupid and kind of obvious. But what if Kubrick did all of these weird things with the intent of making the hotel feel all the more haunted and weird like, what if nothing was real the whole time and they were just at some abandoned hotel for the entirety of the movie. But that's what this doc does to you after repeated watching you start to question the fabric of everything that has to do with the film. I can never watch the Shining the same way again and that's how I felt after the first time I watched this movie. Going back to the conspiracy theories of the film, only one really made sense and that was the one that was trying to teach a lesson about how we should treat the past and how to deal with it if it's causing us too much pain. I feel logically it fits best with the film. I have always felt like people look way to deep into things and I think this doc is a perfect example, the only way we could know what it means is if Kubrick told us what lies under the surface. As we all know he is dead so we will never find out. I apologize if this response looks as if I am rambling but I feel like it should. I feel like the film itself was almost rambling with people talking about the same thing over and over, mentioning how the pull the number 42 virtually out of their ass and how that must mean the film is about the holocaust. Which it may very well be, I am not gonna pretend that I know what it's about, even though I think they are all wrong. All I know is we will never know unless Kubrick wrote what was happening down and stashed it somewhere and until that document comes out its all subjective.
ReplyDeleteI have not seen the Shining. Watching this doc in spite of that, I got to see this as an analysis rather than an analysis of one of my favorite films. Going in to this I really did not want to watch just because I had to dedicate time to watching both films. The film though did feel like an essay in that I got enough of what the story was about in order to understand what was being discussed. Breaking it down in 9 parts made it feel stupid long even though it was only an hour and forty minutes. The biggest difference I found with this and other docs we've watched, aside from the subject matter, is the way it conducts the interviews. We don't really see who is talking and it will switch speakers during the same argument to further the support if the theory. I felt this was effective because we really do need that further support to get behind some of the more outlandish theories. With the theories being so wild its interesting to note that there are nine of them, with each being a hard stretch with a lot of evidence to support it. It is truly hard to know for certain without having seen the Shining and having my life changed by it, but it is hard to believe all of these are true. It's truly wild how I felt during this thinking it was so obvious that all of these theories are real but as soon as it ends it makes you think about what could be real and what is just speculation and I feel like thats what the Shining is about. Isn't the Shining about what is real and what isn't? Maybe Kubrik is a true genius and had all of these things in the film just to mess with people and make something out of nothing, but keep in mind that I don't know what I'm talking about, I haven't seen The Shining.
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