Study Questions: Week Nine

The Dream of Reason Breeds Monsters

Barry Lyndon (1975) and The Shining (1980)

Both these films are as much a comment on film genres (here the horror film and the historical epic or romance). Barry Lyndon explores the persistence of human mendacity which lies beneath the stately elegance of eighteenth-century aristocratic life, and The Shining locates the heart of horror not in an alien other but within the heart of an American family. Consequently, these films demand an attention to detail and to filmmaking technique seldom required by familiar genre films.

Barry Lyndon: The Dream of Reason.

1. Barry Lyndon is in many ways a deceptive narrative. It moves slowly, and the actions are often anticipated by the authoritative voice over (the ostensible narrator). The mise-en-scene is so rich in spectacle that it overhelms the action and the inexpressive Redmond Barry (Ryan O'Neal) and his hapless wife (Marisa Berenson). In a sense the film seems to exaggerate all the weaknesses of the Hollywood costume epic. In Kubrick's hands, however, these apparent weaknesses are often used to comment on both an idealized view of the past and on the genre itself. Go back and watch the opening sequences again (the duel which kills Barry's father and the game of cards with his cousin Nora). Where does the action clearly undercut the narrator's descriptions of it? How does the beauty of the settings prove to be at odds with human motive and behavior? What is Nora's opinion of her cousin's devotion? What does Barry's stony passivity say about his naivety and the blindness caused by his adoration?

2. How does Nora's conversation about love with Capt. Quinn (Leonard Rossiter) both reveal her manipulative nature and undermine the rhetoric of romantic love? How do the various visual elements ins Quinn's entrance with his company at first make the military men seem heroic and glamorous and then reveal Quinn as a foppish poseur? Consider the setting, the camera movement, the close-ups of faces, etc.

3. Lying with straight faces seems to be one skill shared by all the main characters. Consider Barry's encounter with the German farm wife, his reports to Potzdorf (Hardy Kruger) on the Chevalier's actions (Patrick Magee), and many other examples. Consider Grogan's behavior as Barry's second in the duel with Quinn. What do these endless duplicities say about aristocratic society, and how do they call into question of all the glamorous surface spectacle?

4. Throughout the film certain images, phrases, and shots are repeated: Barry being reminded that Quinn has an annual income of L1500, the British grenadiers marching into Barryville and later marching on the French defenses, Lord Bullington (Leon Vitali) seen at his mother's side as he grows older, the ornate goat cart which carries young Brian (David Morley) twice, the repeated whipping of Bullington by Barry. What do these repetitions tell us about military heroics, the real concern of men of "honor," the vanity of human wishes?

5. How reliable a narrator is the voice over? In what scenes is it necessary to see the ironic distance between the voice and the action on the screen?

6. In several Kubrick films images or phrases from the 18th Century figure prominently (i.e. Col. Dax quoting Samuel Johnson on patriotism, the architecture of the ruined casino in Clockwork Orange, the decor of the concluding scene in 2001). Each time the earlier century, often called "The Age of Reason," appears to represent a moral norm from which to judge the failings of contemporary and the systems and institutions they inhabit. To what degree does Barry Lyndon suggest that this vision of a more humane and reasonable world is only a dream, and illusion?

7. How does the narrator's description of Barry's determination to marry money and a title throw an ironic light on his first meeting with Lady Lyndon? If the narrator had not announced Barry's motive, would the scene be any different from the highly romantic encounter between Newland Archer Daniel Day Lewis) and Madame Olenska (Michelle Pfeiffer) in The Age of Innocence? Why? Why not?

8. How do the three duels (Barry's father's, Capt. Quinn's, and Lord Bullington's) help to structure a rather episodic narrative? What crucial turns in the action do they mark? How does the recurring shot of Lyndon Castle from across the large park serve the same way of ordering the narrative? How does the lighting and the colors of these images reflect the course of Barry's fortunes?

9. The scene in which Lord Bullington is persuaded by the accountant Graham (Philip Stone) Lady Lyndon's chaplin, Reverend Runt (Murray Melvin) is familiar enough in historical epics. The legitimate heir (and often the hero) returns from exile to challenge the villain and set things right. How does Kubrick manage to use the characters, their expressions, and what we already know of their motives to satirize this convention?

10. If civility, honor, love, and heroism are all exposed as shams, what really drives the society of Barry Lyndon? How does the final image of Lady Lyndon signing the bill for her husbands annual remittance punctuate that driving force for the audience? And what is the ominous significance of the date: 1789?

The Shining: Honey, I'm Home!

1. What is revealed about the Torrance family in the opening sequences (before they leave for the Overlook)?

2. How do the settings (and the way they are filmed) during Jack Torrance's (Jack Nicholson) interview with Ulman (Barry Nelson) contribute to a sense of foreboding and danger?

3. Note the manner in which Kubrick uses background images to comment on the nature and/or fate of the characters. For instance, what is the significance of Danny watching the Roadrunner cartoons? In what ways might Danny's (Danny Lloyd) situation be compared to the Roadrunner?

4. How are we to take the supernatural elements in the film, particularly those that seem to warn of dangers to come (i.e. the bloody elevator, the Grady twins, the woman in the bath)? Are they to be taken literally (as Dracula in vampire films), or are they images which indicate the states of mind of the characters?

5. Why did Jack injure his son (before the film opens)?

6. What is the significance of Jack's manuscript? What is the relation between his writing and his increasingly violent impulses? What does it say about Jack's dream of being a writer, and artist?

7. What is the significance of his meetings with Grady (Philip Stone)? Although Grady was real enough, is his encounter with Jack to be taken literally or as a way of seeing into Jack's mind?

8. Likewise, what is the significance of his encounter with the bartender at what seems to be a party taking place in the 1920s? What do you learn about Jack's feelings toward his family? Is he really drinking, or is he regressing into fantasy?

9. Why is Wendy (Shelly Duval) so passive? How does her behavior (consider her conversation with Danny's doctor) make the family more vulnerable to Jack's violence?

10. How does Jack get out of the refrigerator room? Is this one incident where we are to take the supernatural literally? Is there any other incident which insists that the ghosts are real? Or are the conventions of the horror genre a red herring drawing viewers from the true horror. Which is . . . ?

11. What is "the shining"? Consider Hallorann's (Scatman Crowthers) encounter with Danny and his decision to return to the Overlook to help him.

12. What is the significance of the photo which shows Torrance in a group of Scott Fitzgerald-like characters?