"Don't scoff, turn the page" Eric Overmyer wrote in his brilliant conspiracy play "In Perpetuity Throughout The Universe" but you might be excused at laughing in the face of some not all of the hidden meanings revealed in in LA filmmaker Rodney Ascher's ROOM 237. Room 237 us a documentary about five people obsessed with Stanley Kubrick's "The Shining". You know, "heeere's Johnny". The story of a caretaker and his wife and son taking care of the Overview Hotel for the winter while the husband, a terrific Jack Nicholson goes crazy. The son has "The Shining", the ability to see through the layers of the world to the spirits underneath.
That's the text, and the conspiracy theorists see:
1. Subliminal sex messages.
2. An apology for the genocide of the Native Americans.
3. An apology for faking film of the Apollo 11 landing on the moon.
4. A remembrance of the holocaust.
5. A study of human history forgotten by mankind.
And at times they have a point, though as the late Roger Ebert having the Overlook built on an Indian burial ground isn't subtext, it's text. And some of it is really crazy and funny (sometimes a penis is not a penis). Towards the end, "The Shining" is run forward and superimposed the movie is run backward-though the definition of happenstance, it makes for some fascinating juxtapositions.
But in the end, is there more going on.? Well, if you are destroying a native American burial to build a hotel, you can bet the ghosts are gonna be mad. And if you are making a movie about familial genocide over and over again, and you find many references about mass genocide, the chances are excellent Kubrick meant to put it there.
Perhaps the most interesting idea is that people who obsess about the movie become like the Jack Nicholson character, lost in the Overview Hotel for eternity.
Music: The composer Bela Bartok's music for strings, percussion and Celestais scary and haunting and shakes you whenever it appears
Movie: B
Music: A