What filmmaking techniques does The Shining use?

CineCode breaks down 5 techniques in The Shining (1980): Steadicam, One-Point Perspective, Unreliable Narrator, Diegetic Sound Design and Continuity Errors as Design.

Who directed The Shining?

Stanley Kubrick directed The Shining, released in 1980. CineCode also covers Fear and Desire (1953), Killer's Kiss (1955), The Killing (1956), Paths of Glory (1957), Spartacus (1960), Lolita (1962).

What films are similar to The Shining?

Films that share techniques with The Shining include Atonement (2007), Parasite (2019), Her (2013), Fight Club (1999).

Horror · Drama

The Shining

Stanley Kubrick, 1980

A writer takes a job as winter caretaker at a remote hotel. There, supernatural forces (or his own cracking mind) push him toward violence against his family. This is Kubrick's definitive study in dread built from geometry.

2 Cinematography 1 Narrative 1 Sound 1 Editing

At a glance

The Shining is a 1980 horror and drama film directed by Stanley Kubrick. This breakdown covers 5 techniques (2 cinematography, 1 narrative, 1 sound and 1 editing), each with the scene where you can see it. If you like how it is made, Atonement uses several of the same techniques.

Cinematography

Steadicam

Mounting the camera on a stabilizing rig worn by the operator so it can glide smoothly through a space. It moves as freely as handheld but without the shake.

How this film uses it

Kubrick used the Steadicam, a stabilized camera rig that glides smoothly, to follow Danny through the Overlook's corridors at child height. At that height and that close behind him, the camera feels like a predator chasing him.

Where to see it

Danny's tricycle rides through the hotel corridors. The camera glides right behind him.

Cinematography

One-Point Perspective

Framing a shot so every line in it runs toward 1 point in the center. The picture looks perfectly symmetrical, which can feel hypnotic, stagey or oppressive.

How this film uses it

Kubrick is fairly obsessive about centered, symmetrical framing all through the Overlook. It makes the hotel look like an abstract, impossible space that is beautiful and terrifying at the same time.

Where to see it

Every corridor shot in the hotel. The overhead view of the hedge maze stands out in particular.

Narrative

Unreliable Narrator

Telling the story through a character you can't trust, because they are lying, mentally unwell or fooling themselves. At some point, you have to rethink what you were told.

How this film uses it

The film never fully settles if the hotel's ghosts are real or if Jack's alcoholic psychosis is making them up. You can read the story as psychological and as supernatural at the same time.

Where to see it

The Gold Room bar scenes. You're left wondering if Lloyd always existed.

Sound

Diegetic Sound Design

Using sounds the characters themselves can hear, like footsteps, radios or traffic, to build tension or show how someone feels. The sound does more than make the scene realistic.

How this film uses it

Kubrick builds dread out of sounds that come from inside the hotel. Danny's Big Wheel rumbles over the wooden floors and goes quiet each time it crosses a rug. In the Gold Room, old dance band music plays for a party that shouldn't be there. Familiar sounds come out alien and threatening.

Where to see it

Danny's Big Wheel rides through the hallways. The wheels are loud on the wooden floors and go silent on the carpet.

Editing

Continuity Errors as Design

Breaking the usual rules that keep space and time consistent between shots, on purpose. The mismatches tell you the film's reality or a character's view of it can't be trusted.

How this film uses it

Kubrick deliberately put in furniture, windows and architectural features that move or disappear between cuts. The suggestion is that the layout of the Overlook itself is impossible.

Where to see it

Mr. Ullman's office. The window behind his desk couldn't exist in an inside room.

Questions

The Shining: quick answers

What filmmaking techniques does The Shining use?: CineCode breaks down 5 techniques in The Shining (1980): Steadicam, One-Point Perspective, Unreliable Narrator, Diegetic Sound Design and Continuity Errors as Design.
Who directed The Shining?: Stanley Kubrick directed The Shining, released in 1980. CineCode also covers Fear and Desire (1953), Killer's Kiss (1955), The Killing (1956), Paths of Glory (1957), Spartacus (1960), Lolita (1962).
What films are similar to The Shining?: Films that share techniques with The Shining include Atonement (2007), Parasite (2019), Her (2013), Fight Club (1999).

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