#delbert grady

The Shinning is one helluva of a horror film. It takes a while for the horror to reveal itself in its entirety, but that same slow buildup is to its benefit for one primary reason. The horror here is purely psychological and it culminates in something far scarier than a traditional horror movie monster. It isn't a monster physically hunting the characters, instead it's something stirring a darkness that already existed. So, enter our villains... Jack Torrance and The Overlook Hotel.

The Overlook Hotel is an interesting entity to say the least. It's not just a haunted hotel, but also a living breathing creature of pure unadulterated evil. The Overlook isn't merely a place, it is a being with desires, and its ultimate desire is to sustain itself by absorbing souls. It's a very base and dark creature, so it's only fitting that it sustains itself by stoking man's inner darkness by isolating people from the rest of the world. Which brings us to its newest prey.

Jack Torrance is a loser. While his book counterpart has more decent moments, in the film he's more of a piece of shit before he actually does snap. However if there's two consistent things about him, it's that he's an utter failure of a person who isn't cut out to be a family man and that some part of him did want to try being a decent father at least (yet he had no qualms about getting into it with his wife). He's a recovering alcoholic who hurt is son once when he DID drink, prompting him to stop. Hell, this isn't even mentioning how he was initially terrified of the idea of killing his own family early in the film. Jack was never a good man, but it's clear that he cared enough to attempt being a half-decent one.

Now onto the scene itself. A Jack who has become "close" to the hotel enters the Gold Room for a "drink," surrounded by what one would initially consider to be hallucinations. Then he bumps into a butler and spills said "drink," being escorted into the bathroom by this same butler. Next thing he knows, the butler he is currently interacting with turns out to be a dead man, Delbert Grady. Jack looks unnerved, but most importantly he is doing his best to hide it by talking about how Grady killed himself and his family back when he was the former caretaker of the hotel. Then, through Grady, the hotel reminds Jack... he's the caretaker this time around.

Now is the point where the hotel officially starts getting to Jack, telling him that his son is trying to bring an outside party. Jack initially is surprised by this news and wondering how, before commenting that he is a "willful boy" and pinning the blame on his mother. Then "Grady" proposes that Jack should kill his family, with the unspoken reward for such an act being a permanent position within the hotel. This is the point where Jack fully gives in to his growing madness and inner darkness, his utter weakness on full display as he lets the hotel finally claims him with the promise of becoming apart of it.

(Ketchup warning)