The book is much better

Your title should be "to some people the book is much better"

After all not everyone shares that opinion.

No, it's not.

... there has been technological advancement, but how little man himself has changed.

As a whole I can't agree that the book is any better, let alone much better. The changes to the plot were pretty much justified. Kubrick couldn't figure out a way to make the hedge animals work without looking ridiculous, and I like the hedge maze much better anyway. Hallorann's death sucked since he was such a likable character, but his murder let us know that Jack wasn't messing around. You also have great additions like the creepy hallway twins and Jack's "novel". I did miss the backstory of the hotel though.

The characters I don't even compare because they're actually just completely different characters, and although they may be less sympathetic than the ones in the book they strike me in many ways as more realistic. Especially Danny, who you say has no personality but to me comes across as a greatly traumatized child thanks to the constant bombardment of horrifying visions. And Wendy, who is no longer confident or attractive, strikes me as a woman who would more plausibly find herself stuck in a marriage to an abusive psychopath. As for Jack Torrance, we may have lost a sympathetic anti-hero but we gained one hell of a villain.

And the ending isn't dumb. On the contrary it's there to make you think. Is Jack a reincarnation? Was he slipping in and out of the past? Or has the hotel just absorbed him? It's the same type of thing Kubrick did with 2001. He took King's story and made it his own.

I sorta of agree with the OP, the book is wonderful and Dick Hallorann is the hero in book and spoiler he doesn't die. He actually plays a pivotal role in the sequel novel Dr. Sleep. '

All that said I love the movie too! 😀

I have read the book and seen the film many times. To this day I still say the film is better. One of my bigger reasons is. A Much better ending in the film and the people in the story are more believable. In the book I couldn't buy the jack is good, jack is bad, oh wait, jack is good again. Completely did not work for me. People talk about Jack loving his family and being a good man in the book. I did not see that in the book. I saw a man who secretly hated his family but he hid it better in the book. Much like jack in the film,Jack is the villian!! Also Wendy in the film you could believe she would stay with a man like jack. in the Book, Not so much.

Hedge animals vs a maze. The maze was more believable and fit into the Overlook is a maze of it's own in which jack gets lost in.

The film is much more Complex than the book or King just didn't go far enough with his ideas and Kubrick saw that. So in the film we have a Delbert Grady and a Charles Grady. We also have a jack Torrance and a Mr Torrance. Much more complex than the book and more thought provoking. The bathroom scene is thought Provoking more than most films alone.

The ending of the film vs the book. In the book things were building up nicely, But the ending was anti Climatic. It was like a Disney ending. The freezing to death in a maze was Epic!! Jack freezes to death in a maze much like the Overlook is a Maze and of course what is in the Overlook Lives on. Forever and ever and ever. Quite a bit more Creepy with the music playing over the tour of the Overlook.

Also In the film there are hints that jack has been at the Overlook before much the same as the book. But the film plays with that idea differently or go father into that idea and for that reason is much better. The photo at the end Confirms that Jack was at the Overlook in some form in the past.


The very fact that we are still talking about the film after 36 years shows that the film is timeless and a true Classic.

Kubrick did away with the hedge animals because the available effects back then were not up to the job.

I too was disappointed when I first saw the movie. The book is just so visceral and hallucinogenic in its imagery, I find it hard to believe when people say that the technology at the time simply wasn't up to creating the hedge animals and other weird shenanigans like a living fire hose. This was the same Kubrick who made 2001, whose revolutionary special effects still hold up to this day and far outclass anything in The Shining.

One of the best scenes in the book is when Jack actually notices that the hedge animals are following him and moving closer every time he turns his back. This is a scene that doesn't require computer effects or advanced visuals, but a simple use of camera trickery and changing perspective. Along with so many other great scenes that add so much foreboding atmosphere, like the wasps' nest, or Jack finding the scrapbook in the basement detailing the hotel's past.

But at the end of the day, Kubrick wasn't interested in adapting King's The Shining. He just took the bare bones of the story and revamped it into his own vision. Stanley obviously didn't want the supernatural side of things to be too overt. In the book, the entire plot point of Danny's shining bringing out the ghosts of the hotel, and the Overlook wanting to absorb Danny's power by possessing Jack, is sort of glossed over in the movie.

In the end, the film is a paranormal haunted house/slasher, whereas the book is a supernatural thriller.

~ I'm a 21st century man and I don't wanna be here.

I think that Harry guy really likes you.

~ I'm a 21st century man and I don't wanna be here.