The Shining - 'Come Play With Us' Scene Analysis

The Shining is a 1980 psychological horror film directed by Stanley Kubrick.

The ‘Come Play With Us’ scene starts with the camera tracking Danny as he rides his tricycle through the hotel corridors. As he reaches the first corner, there is a non-diegetic high pitch sound, which gets higher the closer he gets. Sudden high pitch noises are a common convention in horror films as they build fear, such as in the shower scene in Hitchcock’s Psycho. This made the scene very tense, as I was expecting there to be something around the first corner. However, the camera lingers on the shot of the corridor for a few seconds after Danny disappears, which felt to me as if it was trying to suggest that the camera didn’t want to follow Danny, because he was heading towards something dangerous. This increased the tension, as I wanted to protect Danny from whatever it was he was about to face, because watching him on his tricycle made him look so small and innocent.
The scene then cuts to Danny in a different corridor. The camera continues to track him from behind, and as he turns the corner, the camera turns with him and we see the two girls at the end of the corridor. This shocks the viewer, as they know that the only people in the hotel are Jack, Wendy and Danny, so for these two girls to be here, something is probably very wrong. The scene then cuts to a close up of Danny’s face. He appears shocked, so we know that the he didn’t expect the girls to be there either. 

When it cuts back to a long shot of the corridor, the camera is now closer to Danny and the girls. This happens almost every time the scene cuts in between Danny’s reaction and the girls. This creates fear with the audience, as it as if they are subconsciously obeying the girls’ request of ‘come play with us’. The closer we get to them, the more it feels as though we can’t prevent doing as they say. Their voices are in unison and are slightly echoed. This is common in lots of horror movies, as it creates an unnatural effect that unnerves the audience. This, as well as how the shots of them saying ‘Forever… and ever… and ever’ are cuts between shots of them lying covered in blood on the ground, suggests that the intend to kill Danny, or at least intend for him to die so that he can join them. As we move closer to the girls, it seems less and less likely that Danny will be able to resist them. This scared me as I felt protective of Danny, as there was no one else there, and if I was moving towards the girls without realising, then how would he, a small, naïve child, be able to stop himself from doing the same? 

The girls wear matching blue, frilly dress and are very pale, with neat hair. They reminded me of porcelain dolls, which are known for being creepy due to their distorted realism - they look realistic, but something you can’t quite put your finger on is wrong. To me, this seemed to be a reflection of a lot of things in the film, such as the hotel itself and the Torrance family; they all seem normal, but something is very wrong underneath it all.
We are then shown a shot of the girls covered in blood. The scene then cuts back to a close up of Danny’s shocked expression. I noticed that Danny is wearing red and blue, which I realised was the same colour scheme as the girls when they’ve been killed. The majority of what Danny is wearing is red, with only a little bit of his blue jumper showing. It is mostly covered by his red jacket. This suggested to me that Danny was going to face a similar fate to the girls, since they were all young and seemingly innocent, and alone in a house as their fathers went insane. At the back of the shot, there is a cross in the window, where the two most visible parts of the window frame can be seen intersecting behind the curtain. Crosses appear throughout The Shining, but are usually inverted. This is a common convention in horror movies, as it suggests, especially when the cross is inverted, the presence of evil, and that there is a very satanic feeling. This is what crosses have suggested to me throughout the rest of the film, however here, whilst it could also suggest that something evil was influencing Grady when he killed his children, I also think it shows how the girls are victims, and that they should be prayed for, as the layout of the shot reminds me of the layout of a church. For example, a large cross at the front and centre, and a room that widens towards the back. 

Then, there is a close up of Danny covering his eyes with his hands, which emphasises how young he is by suggesting the childlike idea of ‘if I can’t see it, it can’t see me’. He then spreads his fingers, and slowly peaks through them, building tension as we want to know if the girls are still there. In lots of horror movies, the threat typically moves when the victim isn’t looking. As the girls have been stationary this entire time, I expected them to be closer to Danny because the music was getting louder like it had as he turned the corner to see them. Instead, the girls are gone, which made me incredibly relieved as they made me really uncomfortable. This is due to their unnatural presence, such as how they look and speak.

The editing in this scene is significant, because the shot length gets shorter as the scene goes on. It starts with a shot of the corridor, which is very slow and lasts almost fifteen seconds, and by the end of the girls saying ‘forever… and ever… and ever’ the shots of them covered in blood last a maximum of three seconds. I think this reflects how panicked Danny is getting, because at the beginning he is very calm, happily riding around the hotel, and then he is very suddenly confronted with two strange girls he has only seen before in visions, who he knows were killed. The shortness of time also increases suspense for the audience, as it is similar to the other visions Danny has had, and creates both anticipation and fear as the film progresses, and also curiosity to figure out the mystery behind both Danny and the hotel.