'Room 237' illuminates the spell cast by Kubrick and 'The Shining'

Jack Nicholson in The Shining

Most people that know me know that The Shining is one of my favorite movies of all time. Its infamous carpet pattern is even the case for my iPad mini.

I've always loved the film on its own terms as a piece of entertainment but it can be enjoyed on so many deeper, more complex levels as well.

This intense, obsessive brand of fandom is brilliantly realized in the unforgettable 2012 documentary Room 237 (the title refers to a mystical room in the Overlook Hotel), which explores various theories (some conspiratorial) about what this mercurial horror film really means.

Room 237 might be maddening to some people, even those who have a cursory interest in Stanley Kubrick's 1980 film. But for a Shining junkie like me, it has a dreamlike quality and an earnestness that is worth applauding.

For years, The Shining has been dismissed as one of Kubrick's lesser achievements, his bid for the mainstream. But more recently, like so many of his works, it has grown in stature. Jack Nicholson's incredibly physical, even possessed, performance is one of his best. The camerawork is sublime and breathtaking, as is the production design. But what makes The Shining endure as a masterpiece is it's hidden messages, and, some would argue, hidden agenda.

For instance, the movie has several glaring continuity errors, which for a director as legendarily perfectionist and meticulous as Kubrick, just doesn't make any sense.

So what if those "mistakes" were intentional, an attempt to implant subliminal messages into a viewer's mind? We'll never know, but part of the fun of the movie is trying to figure out what the truth is.

Room 237 largely focuses on three widely held theories about the film. They're presented by fanatics wisely heard only in voice-over, with images from the film (and a variety of other movies, including some of Kubrick's) to illustrate their points.

The American Indian theory: I had actually heard this one (I don't remember where or when) before I saw the documentary and it seems very plausible to me. The premise is that the movie version of The Shining is really an allegory about the white settlers' slaughtering of Native Americans.

The movie is very upfront about the Overlook Hotel being built on an Indian burial ground (in Room 237, the elevator full of blood is said to be carrying the remains of Indians). There are plenty of American Indian accouterments in and around the Overlook and there are plenty of passing references to the Gold Rush and the American migration west.

The moon landing theory: This is easily the most outrageous but still one of the more entertaining ideas about the film. The theory is that Stanley Kubrick helped stage and shoot the "fake" Apollo moon landing. Now, believers in this premise want to be clear that they're not saying we never landed on the moon, just that the footage we see of Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin is fake.

The movie is supposed to be full of clues from Kubrick in an attempt to reveal his role in the hoax. Look closely and you'll see Danny wearing an Apollo 11 sweater. There are plenty of other moments you can choose to read into here -- but I don't give this one much weight.

The World War II/Holocaust theory: This concept intrigues me the most. Kubrick was reportedly fascinated by the Holocaust for both historical and cultural reasons. He had wanted to make a film about it but found the subject matter too overwhelming and bowed out once Spielberg made Schindler's List. Still, he did an extraordinary amount of research on the topic and the film is rich in symbolism. Jack Nicholson's character uses a German typewriter, the ubiquitous use of the number 42, and so many more details from the film seem to conjure up a very specific, fascistic version of evil.

Of course all of these theories could be somewhat or entirely true, but they could also be total figments of a particularly obsessive imagination. For instance, a lot of time is spent dwelling on a window that seems architecturally impossible, but then again most films present us with inconsistencies such as these and we don't give them a second thought.

Kubrick films are so unique in this way, because he was such a mysterious, hermetic figure and he spoke very little publicly about the meaning and intent behind his films. He left an impressive, and varied body of work behind but not so many films that they can't all be digested. And it's because of this that fans can really plunge deep into his work and even find connective tissue between works that seem so wildly disparate as Full Metal Jacket, Barry Lyndon, 2001 and Eyes Wide Shut.

The point is The Shining is a movie you can play with forever and ever and ever...