MAIN PAGE ⎔ SECTION PAGE ⎔ SITE MAP ⎔ GLOSSARY
REDRUM ROAD – ROUND THREE – SKIP TO A PAGE
COME TOGETHER ⎔ SOMETHING ⎔ MAXWELL’S SILVER HAMMER ⎔ OH! DARLING ⎔ OCTOPUS’S GARDEN ⎔ I WANT YOU ⎔ HERE COMES THE SUN ⎔ BECAUSE ⎔ YOU NEVER GIVE ME YOUR MONEY ⎔ SUN KING ⎔ MEAN MR. MUSTARD ⎔ POLYTHENE PAM ⎔ SHE CAME IN THROUGH THE BATHROOM WINDOW ⎔ GOLDEN SLUMBERS ⎔ CARRY THAT WEIGHT ⎔ THE END
ROUND ONE START ⎔ ROUND TWO START ⎔ SPECIAL: STORY ROOM
- The transition to this final track starts right on King’s credit appearance. I’ve always read this as a huge thumbs-up to King from Kubrick. The next credit to appear in this section is Jan Harlan, Kubrick’s brother-in-law, as executive producer.
- Round 1 of this moment is first freakout Jack achieving peak freakout. In fact, this is the only time Jack actually reams out Wendy over interrupting his precious writing. It’s so volatile that you feel it for the rest of the movie. There is, of course, the “so fucking typical” scene where he flips out about her general desire to leave the hotel. But in terms of Jack’s writing itself leading to terror there’s only the freakout and the All Work pages. Nicholson also said he drew his inspiration for that performance from his actual freakouts at his actual partner for interrupting his own writing. So I wouldn’t be surprised if Kubrick felt something about King’s life story was in that scene.
- Round 2 of this moment is Wendy pacing back and forth, plotting escape, but specifically the moment when she reaches the bookshelf by the washroom, and turns. Could a King novel be buried in there? That’s the shelf that Shakespeare and Dostoevsky appear on, so, again, I think Stanley might have had a slight bit of admiration for ol’ Steve.
- “Oh yeah! Alright! Are you gonna be in my dreams/Tonight?” – Appears during Tony Burton’s credit (Durkin) and Anne Jackson’s (the Doctor). These are both seven dwarves in the Snow White analysis, which feels apt, considering Snow spends a good part of her story dreaming.
- I also wonder if this is why we know about Kubrick’s epic weeks of chess with Burton. Kubrick said it was one of the toughest challenges he’d had in a while. Perhaps he dreamed of Burton’s technique later on.
- Also, Anne Jackson has the name Jackson. Jack’s son. Jack will die dreaming of murdering his child.
- Also, the mountain to the left is Mount Cannon, named for Walter Bradford Cannon whose life work as a physiologist lead him to study the effects of trauma on soldiers. One of the symptoms of PTSD is terrible nightmares, though Cannon didn’t specifically study that side of it. I think his work could be regarded as a precursor, though, or a close cousin.
- The one Ringo drum solo of all time appears over Joe Turkel (Lloyd), Philip Stone (Grady), and Barry Nelson (Ullman). The three henchmen of the Overlook. And right as it ends we get the Overlook’s chief victim, Scatman Crothers (Hallorann). All these men are arguably best known for these roles (Turkel might be better known for Blade Runner), just as Ringo is best known for being this drummer. A major beat later and we cut to the final zoom in the movie.
- “Love you” – This line is sung over and over (24 times), beginning with Danny Lloyd (Danny), then going to Shelley Duvall (Wendy) and Jack Nicholson (Jack), finally stopping on the wide shot of the photo Jack photo.
- Round two includes Wendy getting through to the US Forest Service, which goes nicely with all this nature imagery. Round 1 includes includes Danny and Wendy out playing together in the snow.
- “And in the end/The love you take/Is equal to the love/You make” – This line starts on the widest shot, moves into the middle shot, and finishes on the close up here. Quite similar to the round 1 version of spooky Jack staring out the window. Also, round 2 backward Wendy spends this passage walking between radio rooms, which means that the spot photo Jack will hang forever is right behind her there, and she’s walking toward it (in a backwards motion), same as the round 3 camera zoomed in on photo Jack.
- As the final “Ah-Ahhhhhh” happens, the shot pans down to reveal the impossible date, and the backward action faces into the final shot of Wild Goose Island (Danny), between Four Bears Mountain (Wendy) and Goat Mountain (Jack). As the music fades to silence, we get this image.
- And you know, I think that’s a sweet thing to go out on. The love that Jack and Wendy made (to take the lyric sexually) lead to Danny. The Wild Goose wouldn’t exist without the Goat and the Bears.
So that’s the end of my look at Redrum Road in its purest and simplest form. However. One of my most major discoveries of recent times involves how the 21 photos at the end of the film proper work like a kind of special code for understanding several other subtexts. It’s a discovery with fairly wide-ranging movie-wide implications, so I decided to re-review Redrum Road looking specifically with how the album plays off everything I learned from doing that study. So if you’re interested in exploring that next level of complexity, start at that last link and read through the prompts at the bottom of each page, and you’ll eventually hit the cross-analysis. Or if you think you’re ready to dive straight into that analysis, click here.
You might also enjoy learning about The Rum and the Red
MAIN PAGE ⎔ SECTION PAGE ⎔ SITE MAP ⎔ GLOSSARY
OTHER MAIN PAGES FOR SHINING ANALYSIS
THE MIRRORFORM ⎔ THE BEATLES ⎔ THE RUM AND THE RED
BACKGROUND ART ⎔ OVERLOOK PHOTOGRAPHS ⎔ GOLDEN SPIRALS
PHI GRIDS ⎔ PATTERNS ⎔ VIOLENCE AND INDIGENA ⎔ ABSURDITIES
THE STORY ROOM ⎔ ANIMAL SYMBOLS ⎔ THE ANNOTATED SHINING
EYE SCREAM 