Something – Round 2

“Something in the way she moves/Attracts me like no other lover” – In Summer of ’42, a young man finds himself drawn to a woman who’s a fair bit older and already in a relationship with a bomber pilot overseas. There’s no overt reason for his attraction other than his noticing her in town (saying goodbye to her pilot lover); in fact, he basically has to conspire to build the relationship that eventually does crescendo. Wendy is showing this to Danny, but it’s unclear if she understands why it’s odd to show an R-rated sex film to a child on a Monday morning (why is it broadcasting this early? even if it is edited for television…). The year is 1979, so the film has been out for eight years. As we’ve seen, Wendy is associated to conquest, so this is possibly more of a comment on her general interest in the conquest of Hermie (the boy) upon Dorothy (the woman).
And also, the TV and windows make a mask of both Jack and Grady’s faces, as if their words are the movie. By which I mean that the attraction going on between Hermie and Dorothy is like the attraction going on between Grady and Jack. Grady is seducing Jack into this notion of themselves as infinite beings, infinite justice-makers, who get to “correct” their loved ones.
Also, backward Jack and Grady are discussing how Danny is “trying to bring an outside party, into this situation”, so, without trying to be gross, Danny is attracting Hallorann to the hotel like no other.

“I don’t wanna leave her now/You know I believe in how” – Danny starts asking if he can go get his fire engine.
Also, the song playing overtop of Jack and Grady here is Home by Henry Hall and the Gleneagles. This plays into what I was talking about during round 1 Golden Slumbers about how we can never “go home again”, but how our desire to venture past the familiar (like the Apollo 11 mission) is part of a desire to return to the womb. If we read Something as a comment on Home, Danny’s urge to go get his fire truck is his way of trying to restore Wendy to her proper mother role. He doesn’t want to leave her (or the sense of “home” she represents), but he’ll do it if it means restoring the familiar.

“Somewhere in her smile, she knows/That I don’t need no other lover” – Grady delivers most of this scene with a smug, hollow, demonic smirk. And I have wondered if the hotel is meant to be feminine. Those who recall my thought about how the maze, the labyrinth, and the world/forest are all connected by repeating postcards will appreciate that the world is usually considered feminine (“Mother Earth”, “The Great Earth Mother“), while the sun is considered masculine. So with that in mind, and with the thought that Grady is an extension of the hotel in mind, this line helps us to regard the hotel as a feminine force. And it does seem to be supplanting Wendy’s role in Jack’s life.
And again, this line applies to Summer of ’42, where Dorothy is blithely, sunnily moving about her kitchen, pretending (perhaps) at not noticing Hermie’s eagerness, despite the fact that things will get very intimate between them before the end.

“I don’t wanna leave her now/You know I believe in how” – Danny has scampered away, while Wendy hollers about lunch. Danny is capable of leaving Wendy, while Jack is incapable of leaving Grady. Even after (as is happening at this moment) Grady suggests that he and Jack are immortal beings.
Also, just a small note: the music that’s begun playing in the mirrorverse here is Al Bowlly’s It’s All Forgotten Now, which pairs nicely with all the “I don’t wanna leave her now” refrains, since the other song is also about putting past differences behind the lovers and staying together.

“You’re asking me, will my love grow?/I don’t know, I don’t know/You stick around now it may show/I don’t know, I don’t know” – This plays across Danny’s whole move from the door to seeing zombie Jack. Danny and Jack are about to quiz each other about their feelings for the hotel, and whether the other likes it here. As for the “stick around now” line, mirror Grady is telling Jack that he’s always been there (as a servant).

This is a complicated and fascinating overlay to study on its own, but for the purposes of this analysis I’ll stick to what we get from Redrum Road. The last time (round 1) we were hearing the instrumental section that plays here, Ullman was accounting for why the hotel doesn’t stay open in the winter, while the film’s final bloodfall was splashing all around him. In that moment, Ullman is making reference to the hotel’s ancient past (“When the hotel was built in 1907…”), and here, Jack is telling Grady that he was most certainly the caretaker here, in 1970, when he blew his brains out. Even though his experience of the ghost ball puts things more around the great depression, just going by the music. So there’s lots of references to the deep past in this interlude (in the Round 3 version, Wendy will be hearing about the “1968 shooting” on the kitchen TV).
But I think there’s something to be said for the “Something in the way she knows” concept of Harrison’s song. Both Jacks here really don’t know what the other person is thinking. There’s nothing in the way he knows.

“Something in the things she shows me/I don’t wanna leave her now/You know I believe in how” – This is a weak one, but Danny is looking into the mirror that reflects, from this position, the spot where REDRUM will be. REDRUM is what Danny is shown by Tony. And also, it really looks like Danny might wanna be leaving right about now.

OTHER MAIN PAGES FOR SHINING ANALYSIS