Heeeeeeere’s Johnny! How many Johns, and even not-Johns, have used that line since Stanley Kubrick’s epic adaptation of Stephen King’s everyday story of hotel management hit the big screen in 1980? I know I have. Very few books, even written by horror master King, have had the effect on me that The Shining did. I guess the fact that I read it while working the night shift helped me appreciate the atmosphere King’s story conjured up. So when the movie came out my expectations weren’t great. Was I ever wrong. The Overlook Hotel of Kubrick’s film was exactly as I’d pictured it, and the changes he’d made to the story for the sake of the adaptation almost uniformly enhanced rather than detracted from the story (the only thing I didn’t particularly appreciate was the change to the ending).

Jack Nicholson is on excellent form as caretaker/writer Jack Torrance, while Shelley Duvall falls apart gracefully as the ever more confused and frightened wife Wendy. Danny Lloyd, who at six years old sent shivers down my spine with his now-famous line “Redrum! Redrum!”, gave up acting after one more movie and is now a professor of biology at a college in Kentucky.

Jack Torrance (Nicholson) interviews for a job as out-of-season caretaker at the Overlook Hotel. He’s recently lost his position as a teacher after a violent outburst and is keen to spend the winter with his family in isolation at the hotel, so that he can have the chance to fulfil his lifelong dream of being a writer. The hotel manager warns Jack that the family will be snowbound through the winter and that the cabin fever this can engender has led in the past to the horrific and brutal murder of his wife and two daughters by a previous caretaker, Charles Grady.

Jack is not dissuaded and sets off for the hotel with his wife Wendy (Duvall) and son Danny (Lloyd). Upon Danny’s arrival at the hotel, head chef Dick Hallorann (an excellent cameo role for Scatman Crothers) recognizes Danny’s telepathic abilities – the “shining” of the title – and speaks to him telepathically. Dick tries to warn Danny about the hotel, and especially about room 237, where something terrible occurred in the past.

The staff complete the moth-balling of the hotel and leave Jack and his family to their lonely vigil. But the family is not alone. And the presence of the spirits in the Overlook Hotel, both inside and outside the bar, are about to make their presence felt by all the family – telepathic or not.

I often wondered whether the reason Kubrick didn’t follow the text of the novel and blow the hotel up at the end had more to do with the limitations of sfx in 1980 than any dramatic licence or alternative storytelling he wanted to bring to the picture. If that’s the case, then with today’s limitless potential for CGI, maybe the time is ripe for a remake? Meanwhile, ITV4 seems to have a monopoly on good horror/thriller movies this week – check out the two movies on that channel in the “worth a look” section.

The Shining: ITV4, Tuesday 17 July, 10pm

Worth a look:
The Dam Busters: C4, Saturday 14 July, 4.40pm
Psycho: ITV4, Monday 16 July, 10pm
Cape Fear: ITV4, Friday 20 July, 10.30pm