When I think of the New Year I think of The Shining, I mean, as far as movies are concerned. Some people think of The Apartment, others The Godfather, Part II and those of lowly breeding, When Harry Met Sally. And it's not like the New Year is even explicitly mentioned in The Shining but between the revellers, the flowing drinks and the men in bear suits giving blow jobs it sure feels like a New Years celebration. Of course, the famous picture at the end says "Juy 4th" and it would have to be since the story goes to great lengths to tell us the Overlook is closed in the winter so clearly it can't be New Years or we have no caretaker shut in with his family with which to propel the plot.
But still, it feels like New Years, and so, that's the movie I think of when December 31st rolls around. And when I think of The Shining, as I did recently, I think of Foul Play with Goldie Hawn and Chevy Chase. Huh? What? Yes, while we cinephiles busy ourselves connecting the dots between the Fords and the Hitchcocks and the Godards the dots between Colin Higgins, writer and director of Foul Play, and Stanley Kubrick go completely unnoticed.
Behold, and Happy New Year:
Go to the actual HD YouTube page for a much bigger, and better, picture.
27 comments:
I can't watch this until I get home. Is it any good?
Serious? In all honesty, even though I am making a joke about the Higgins/Kubrick connection I do find this mash-up I did quite interesting. Watch it all the way through (at about 49 seconds it goes exclusively to helicopter shots) and you'll think, "Hmmm, maybe Kubrick actually DID get the idea from FOUL PLAY." I mean, it is entirely possible. It's even the same damn car model and color!
I was sort of kidding. It was kind of a lame, rude, mildly prick-ish thing to say, so I thought it would be funny.
I look forward to actually watching it though!
No, I knew you were kidding, I was saying "serious?" to not being able to watch it until you got home. Anyway, watching the overhead shots with the Shining theme music reminds me how much I love those opening credits and how menacing Kubrick makes them.
It's an interesting study to do watching the two together. The helicopter shots Kubrick uses move in closer and tighter before pulling away and not once does he go inside the car as Higgins does. Those tiny differences are huge in terms of creating a distanced menacing effect. Even with the music added on the FOUL PLAY opening shots you can still tell it's not a horror film. With Kubrick's you can.
Or did Colin Higgens get the idea from Clint Eastwood's opening to PLAY MISTY FOR ME? This would lean further towards the age-old insinuation that Kubrick was, indeed, the post-modernist's post-modernist;)
PLAY MISTY FOR ME! Hadn't even thought of that one. Although, the car is different and other cars are seen on the road. In FOUL PLAY Higgins makes sure it's only Hawn's car we see which, apart from it being a yellow vw, is the most compelling similarity to the opening of THE SHINING.
I wouldn't be surprised if, as you suggest, Higgins adapted the MISTY opening to suit FOUL PLAY and then Kubrick further adapted the FOUL PLAY opening to suit THE SHINING.
Also, the very, very opening shot of PLAY MISTY FOR ME seems adapted from Wise's SOUND OF MUSIC or WEST SIDE STORY in which it starts out in extreme long shot from above before closing in on the main character.
Greg -
How about you do the opposite, and mash-up the opening credits for "The Shining" with Manilow's "Ready to Take a Chance Again"?
Jack Torrance is ready to take a chance again.
Just watched it. Awesome. Really, that's almost ridiculous.
Yeah, the more I think about it the more I have convinced myself, whether true or not, that the Eastwood/Higgins/Kubrick credit evolution actually occurred starting rough with Play Misty for Me then getting a little tighter with Foul Play until the master stepped in and perfected it with The Shining.
The best things in life are the things we convince ourselves of, true or not.
And there are bears giving blow jobs in "The Shining?" I've gotta watch it again ...
Well, there are guys in bear suits giving blow jobs. Pretty much par for the course at any New Year's celebration I've been to.
I forgot Cooper Huckabee was in this.
I heart him.
"and those of lowly breeding, When Harry Met Sally"
Well, I never was the classiest broad you'd ever meet ...
I bet you're pretty damn classy, especially since you didn't tell me what to do with myself after reading that. My apologies dear Dane. If you think of it, it must be worthwhile.
And Happy New Year!
Oh, don't apologize! It's so true.
Burgess Meredith and Billy Barty and it still wasn't any good? Personally, driving along Pacific Coast Highway always scares the shit out of me, regardless of whether I'm listening to Barry Manilow, the theme from the Shining, or just chatting with Goldie.
Burgess Meredith and Billy Barty are both so damn good in it. I love Barty's Bible salesman schtick as he menacingly gives Goldie the hard sell. Also, Dudley Moore is terrific. It's only Chase that falters, slowing everything down each time he's onscreen with a wooden delivery for every line.
I think we all wanted to give Goldie the hard sell back then.
I forgot how attractive she was until I put this together. She really was a cutie.
Goldie Hawn was hot.
There's still a part of the helicopter shot in the Shining where the camera catches the helicopter's shadow that has always brought me out of the sequence. Every time.
Same here. It's kind of cool to see the mechanics intrude like that sometimes but it does take me out every time too.
Reminds me of the opening shots over Berlin in Wings of Desire, from an angel's pov, where you can briefly see the helicopter blades ... still a cool sequence, though.
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