North Bay After Dark Presents: The Shining

The Shining

Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining is a haunting psychological horror film adapted from Stephen King’s novel of the same name. Blending the supernatural with the deeply human, Kubrick crafts an unsettling meditation on isolation, madness, and the disintegration of family.

Set against the eerie vastness of the snowbound Overlook Hotel, the film transforms a traditional ghost story into something far more psychological and ambiguous. Jack Nicholson’s electrifying performance as Jack Torrance captures a slow descent into obsession and violence, while Shelley Duvall’s fragile intensity as Wendy and young Danny Lloyd’s unnerving calm create a claustrophobic sense of dread that builds with every frame.

Kubrick’s meticulous direction turns the hotel itself into a living presence—its endless corridors, geometric carpets, and surreal imagery evoke a maze of both architecture and mind. The film’s deliberate pacing, eerie score, and striking visual symmetry combine to produce a lingering unease that transcends simple horror.

More than four decades after its release, The Shining endures as one of cinema’s most analyzed and influential works—a masterpiece of ambiguity that explores the fragility of sanity, the weight of isolation, and the darkness that can emerge when the human psyche is left to echo in its own silence.

*This film is part of our CTV Friday Night Gala: Tidbit Treasures from 50 Years of Film, featuring an original copy of The Shining screenplay on display in the Kennedy Gallery from 6–8 PM before the screening. Learn more about this special presentation →

Screening With:

Normie

Student Shorts Showcase

Normie is a young man teetering on the brink of insanity. Will he accept help from his loved ones or embrace the blossoming madness within?

6 mins
Canada, 2016
Dir. Daniel Ira Couchie
Language: English