The Shining (Kubrick Version)

Part 15: Matters of Life and Death

Danny ran down the kitchen hall. His mother had told him to run and hide but he just couldn't leave his mother up in that room by herself. He was worried for her and he knew that the hotel was starting to become more alive. As he had run into the lobby, he had heard footsteps from The Gold Ballroom entrance. Knowing that to enter The Gold Ballroom would be suicide, he ran through into the door next to the reception desk which had a sign saying STAFF ONLY PERMITTED PAST THIS POINT!!! Now he ran, breathing heavily. He had not cried yet. He had no time to cry. He heard grunting noises from around the corner. His father! His father was coming! He saw a cupboard next to him on his left. He opened it, shoved aside the pots and pans and crawled in there. He sat in it and slammed the cupboard door closed, leaving just a gap. His father turned the corner and limped spookily through the hall. The wind howled and whistled. The storm was at its peak now and the wind sounded like an old lady whistling. Danny saw Jack's legs walk past the gap in the cupboard. Fear rushed into his heart and he kept as quiet as a mouse, daring not to breathe. His father was limping. He didn't know why that was but he didn't care. It wasn't his father that was outside anymore. His father was gone. It was the hotel outside now and it was looking for him.

Wendy stood in the bathroom, leaning against the wall. She sobbed her eyes out. How could it of come to this? How could this place be so evil? Then, her son flitted into her mind. She almost screamed. Her son was somewhere! She had to find him and get out of this place! There was a snowmobile outside no doubt and if she could find her son, they could escape in it with Dick if they found him as well! She opened the bathroom door and ran down to the other side of the room. She looked at their luggage, still sitting there peacefully as it had been on Closing Day when Watson and the chambermaids had brought them in. No time for the luggage. They could get it back later on if Jack didn't destroy it. The police or hotel management would give it back to her. But she wouldn't retrieve it from the hotel. If she lived to leave this place, she vowed never to return. The hotel could be the last standing foundation in the world and she wouldn't enter it. She looked out into the empty staff quarters. Jack wasn't there. Time to find her son!

Jack limped through the hotel just as Dick was about to enter through the lobby. The wind whistled and whooped non stop and added to the eeriness of the empty hotel. He was about to limp up a small staircase that led to the lobby when he heard Dick call hello. Without reaction, he walked up the stairs. 

"Anybody here?" called Dick. Jack stood at the top of the staircase, which faced the empty lobby. The lobby was as empty and spooky as an empty building could get. The chairs were all empty, the reception desk was unattended and there were no staff to be seen. He could remember when he had come in for his interview. The lobby had been bright and full of activity, most of the chairs taken and the reception desk occupied. He walked down the staircase, remembering he had seen a cute young woman walk down these stairs with folders. He hid behind a post and waited for Dick.

Dick walked into the lobby. The lobby was quiet and empty. The only sound came from the shrieking wind. He had never been this spooked in his life. He felt like he had walked into an office on a stormy Saturday night that was only open during weekdays and was usually busy. He walked past the reception desk and looked at it. No receptionist. He walked past Ullman's office and he felt someone or something watching him. He realized too late what it was. With a horrific scream, Jack emerged from behind a pole and dug the axe into Dick's stomach. Dick moaned with pain. The last thing he heard was Danny's high pitched scream coming from the kitchen hall and he had time to think

((the boy's still alive, thank God))

before he slumped to the ground and died. Danny had seen all, despite being in the cupboard. He had seen it right in front of him. Jack had heard his screams and stood up, his back hunched. He smiled an evil smile and limped through the lobby as fast as he could.

"DANNY?!" he shouted. "DANNY BOY?!" He stood in front of the kitchen hall and saw Danny emerge from the cupboard and run. "DANNY!" he shouted. "DANNY, GET BACK HERE!" The chase was on. He would catch the son of a bitch and chastise him harshly. 

Wendy ran up the stairs of the staff quarters which were next to her quarters. She called her son's name and that was when the chanting started. She couldn't understand what it was but they were saying something. She stopped on the stairs and held onto the banister in fear of fainting. She came up the third floor and walked to an open door. She looked in and saw two ghosts participating in sexual activity. The man in the bear costume was sucking off a man in a suit's penis. Both men looked at Wendy and Wendy recognized the man in the suit. It was Horace Derwent! He had run the hotel back in the 1940s and 1950s! There he was in his gruesome, dead glory! She stood there, gasping and gawking. The man in the suit smiled. Wendy found her legs at last and she ran down the hall, looking back several times to make sure they were not chasing her. She found herself in the third floor wing, where the most luxurious suites were. She ran down the corridor, terrified. She had to get to the elevator and go to the first floor, no mucking about. Danny wasn't in the staff quarters and there would be absolutely no way he would go past Room 237 again. She believed Danny had seen a woman in that room. What she exactly was, she was unsure. But she knew that it was something evil. She found the elevator. It was next to the Presidential Suite. She hadn't seen the Presidential Suite since Closing Day. Ullman had taken herself, Danny and Jack into the room in the last hour of the hotel's activity whilst Watson had been checking the sign in/out sheets. The room had been marvellous, one of the most fantastic hotel rooms she had seen in her entire life. But Danny had been quite strange in the room. He had told Wendy he didn't like heights, but now as she stood there, looking at it, she realized that her son hadn't been telling the truth. A thought flashed into her head. Three gunshots. Brains splattering on the wall. Blood all over the room. Laughs. Police in the room. Inspectors. Medical examiners. Bodies being escorted by police and medical examiners. Brutal murderers on the loose. Wendy gasped. There had been a brutal murder in The Presidential Suite and Danny had seen the brains and blood of the murder victims all over the walls. But she hadn't seen it! Because she didn't possess Danny's gift! She squealed and pressed her cold finger on the elevator button several times, keeping her eye on the room and the corridor to make sure Jack or any ghosts weren't coming. The elevator dinged and opened. What she saw in there made her heart turn cold. There was confetti, streamers and three balloons in the elevator. And in the middle of the floor, a cat mask. Wendy stood into the elevator and pressed the button for the first floor, panicking. She had a terrible thought of the elevator stopping and being trapped in here. Being trapped in here and her husband murdering her son. The elevator stopped and she was on the first floor, facing The Colorado Lounge which was dark as anything. As she stepped out of the elevator, the three balloons popped. Wendy screamed and turned around. The balloons were burst and there were more streamers and confetti. She ran away from the horrid thing. She had to find Danny!

Jack walked to the back of the hotel. He turned on the outside lights and opened the back door which led to the hedge maze. The hedge maze stood tall and dark in the backyard, like a tall medieval castle at night. Jack knew his son was out here. 

"DANNY!" he shouted. Danny was behind the wheel of the snowmobile which Dick had come in. He peered around. That was when Jack saw him. Danny made a run for it towards the hedge maze. His father limped behind, running as fast as he could. 

"DANNY YOU LITTLE SHIT!" he bellowed. "GET BACK HERE!" Danny ran into the hedge maze and ran through it, turning every corner and twist, while his father loomed behind him, unseen but heard, his angry screaming, shouting, billowing and cursing through the air and in the stormy night.