Featured Image Credit: Warner Bros.
Topics: Jack Nicholson, News, Film and TV, Celebrity, Guinness World Records, Horror
Niamh Shackleton
Topics: Jack Nicholson, News, Film and TV, Celebrity, Guinness World Records, Horror
The Shining is known for being one of the best movies of all time, and it took a lot of work to get there.
The 1980 movie starring Jack Nicholson is still raved about to this day and boasts a 93 per cent score on Rotten Tomatoes' Popcornmeter.
But it took a hell of a lot of work to become the cult classic that it is - which was largely down to director Stanley Kubrick's high expectations.
In fact, one scene took a staggering 148 retakes and holds the Guinness World Record for 'most retakes for one scene with dialogue'.
The scene in question is the 'shine' scene where Danny Torrance (Danny Lloyd) and Dick Hallorann (Scatman Crothers) discussed the ability to 'shine'.
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The excessive number of takes will partly have been down to the fact that it isn't a scene that can be picked up halfway through, says Collider, meaning if either actor messed up, then they will have had to start from the top.
And this isn't the only scene from The Shining that took a ridiculous amount of takes, there was another involving the late Shelley Duvall, who passed away aged 75 in June 2024.
Everyone will remember the moment Wendy Torrance (portrayed by Duvall) swings a baseball bat as her murderous husband Jack Torrance (Nicholson) tells her he's not 'going to hurt her' - rather he's going to 'bash [her] brains in'.
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This particular moment took a whopping 127 retakes - a tiring thought when you think back to how much Duvall was swinging that baseball bat around.
In an interview conducted in the years prior to her death, Duvall recalled how gruelling it was filming The Shining.
"[Kubrick] doesn’t print anything until at least the 35th take," she told The Hollywood Reporter in 2021.
"Thirty-five takes, running and crying and carrying a little boy, it gets hard. And full performance from the first rehearsal. That’s difficult."
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Wendy was a very hysterical character - a trait that proved taxing for Duvall.
Explaining how she prepared for particularly emotional scenes, she said that she would 'think about something very sad' and how much she missed her loved ones, but ultimately her body did not want to cry everyday.
Going on to discuss Kubrick's reported 'cruel and abusive' demeanour and how he treated her on set, Duvall continued: "He’s got that streak in him. He definitely has that."
However, Duvall insisted that Kubrick was 'very warm and friendly' towards her and that he spent a lot of time with her and Nicholson.