wlassiter If you are a conservative and get disgusted by thoughts other than what the govt wants you to believe, you will not like this movie. It is an excellent deep analysis of the shining and kubrick like dan brown did for divinci code. Nothing is proven, yet nothing is disproven. Just disaprovals from candy land conservatives.

justin-fencsak This film portrays the hidden meanings and clues behind Stanley Kubrick's only horror film, "The Shining", based on the best selling book by Stephen King, and why this movie still continues to baffle and confuse purists. This movie is mostly full of interviews, movie clips, and other stuff. If you like the shining, then you'll like this movie. Worth a rental.

Joe Stemme I'm real love-hate with Kubrick and THE SHINING falls in the middle of that spectrum. It's creepy, but, absurd. And, Nicholson is so obviously loony from the get go, that there is no descent into madness. He's already there.And, most of the theories in ROOM 237 are also absurd and often factually and provably false. Further, at least half the stuff the 'theorists' toss out there falls in the category of - Yeah, that's how movies are made! It's obvious that none of the theorists have ever been to a big budget movie set, let alone worked on one. Further, if I were the Cameraman, Editor, Co-ScreenWriter (Diane Johnson), Prop Man, Production Designer, Set Decorator etc. who worked on THE SHINING - I'd be even more angry. Not to mention Stephen King who's original tale is often ignored. It's as if Kubrick made this movie in his backyard all by himself to hear the theorists tell it. Now, we all know that Kubrick was a fanatic about detail, but, THE SHINING would STILL be shooting if he did everything alone as these interviewees would have it. The best line in the whole Doc comes near the end when one of the theorists admits that Kubrick may not have consciously intended for all these hidden meanings to be in his film, but that it didn't matter. Clever way of saying that much of this is B.S., I suppose.All that said, it was entertaining. And, I certainly wish Director Rodney Ascher would have exercised a bit more of a skeptical eye towards the claims. But, he seemed more interested in putting together the clip montages than editing the facts. I've said for decades that Kubrick's films are not only the most analyzed in cinema history, but, also the most OVER-analyzed. He made so relatively few films that his cultists spend years and years combing over every minute detail. ROOM 237 only scratches the surface.P.S. Watched the extras on Disc 2 of the DVD. The most interesting is a panel discussion taped at the Overlook Hotel with Director Mick Garris (the TV Shining mini-series), ROOM 237 Director Rodney Ascher, Kubrick's personal assistant Leon Vitali and the Moon Landing conspiracy guy Jay Weidner.Garris sort of played a peacemaker who feels that everybody has the right to interpret a work of art in any way they wish (including his version). But, the real fireworks were between Vitali and Weidner (who were sitting right next to each other!). Vitali started off by debunking the conspiracy theorists using what I called "Yeah, that's how movies are made!" in my original post. He explained in detail how much of this stuff is just reading way way too much into continuity 'mistakes' and innocent coincidences. The moon conspiracy guy tried his best but Vitali openly disdained him going so far as to make a 'Cross' with his fingers as if warding off a vampire!! For his part, Rodney Ascher tried to play devil's advocate trying to defend his conspiracy theorists under Vitali's withering attack. Ascher also showed some detailed knowledge of the production history of THE SHINING. I just wish he had done more contextualization in his own Documentary! Like I wrote before, it seemed as if Ascher was more interested in putting together pretty montages (of other people's footage, I must add), than doing the basic job of a documentarian in putting some sort of skeptical eye towards his interview subjects.The DVD also includes about 45 minutes of deleted material where the conspiracy theorists drone on some more. (I started fast-forwarding). Not sure if you can find the Overlook Hotel panel footage online. Not worth the effort to track down the DVD maybe, but certainly of interest.P.S. Also on the Moon conspiracy guy: Growing up, the number referred to as to the moon's distance was always 238 Thousand miles - not 237.

leplatypus For me, movies or books explaining movies or books are ungrateful as they implies that the original author fails the job to told the message clearly. Next this habit is an easy way to catch a bit of their success: they don't have to imagine something as they are going to speak about something that already exists. This documentary fails to clear those bad opinions : most of the theories are totally rubbish and stupid : their things only exist in their mind and the meaning they give are the ones they are looking for ! Sure i think that Kubrick planted some precise props or make some intentional bloopers but to say that « shining » is a movie about Indians genocide, the holocaust is too much ! A key with « Room N° » as in every hotel in the world doesn't mean « room moon » ! Similarly, watching it on a same screen forward and backward to discover hidden messages comes from one of a « cuckoo nest » ! For sure, there is some few interesting moments : his alleged involvement into the Apollo mission, Danny drives in the corridors, Jack reading Playgirl, the Overlook maps, the mount of luggage and the accident scene in this snow (because they struck me as funny when watching the movie). At the end, i think that whoever has passion and time (and maybe disorders) can do the same and have fun with loose interpretations and fixations !