I just finished watching the documentary Room 237. This is not a review of the film, but I found it interesting enough to watch. It probably is something you should see if you’re a fan of the film it references – Stanley Kubrick’s, The Shining.
The basic content of the film is interviews with several people who analyze the film for hidden meanings and conspiracy theories. Some are interesting, and some are just plain wacky.
The one piece of information that has stuck with me has to do with numbers. Specifically repeating numbers. Mirrors play a big role in The Shining, and mirrored numbers play a large part as well. Specifically the numbers 12 and 21 and their doubles 24 and 42. What fascinates me the most is how big a role the number 42 plays (I don’t know why it fascinates me, but so be it). Here are the occurrences of 42 in the film:
- When Danny is talking to Tony in the mirror, he has a shirt on with the number 42.
- Danny and Wendy are watching the film “Summer of ‘42” while Jack is upstairs (supposedly) sleeping.
- Room 237, when multiplied together equals 42.
- The number of letters and spaces in “All work and no play makes jack a dull boy” – 42
- When Jack visits the Gold Room and walks up to the bar, the stools are arranged four on the left and two on the right.
- Mr. Halloran’s license plate of his rental car has an obvious 42 on it.
- There are 42 vehicles in front of the Overlook at the beginning of Jack’s interview (not including the Sno-Cat).
- 42 is the number of times Danny says Redrum near the end of the film.
Most of the above information comes from this post about the numbers, though I did think of the 42 letters and spaces of “All work…” before I saw this site 😉
Time to watch The Shining again and find some more number 42’s.
cc licensed ( BY NC SA ) flickr photo by Alex Eylar: http://flickr.com/photos/hoyvinmayvin/5133858870/
One Response
Well, it is the answer to the life, the universe, and everything so makes sense it would appear so much…
And I gotta see that movie post haste. Stephen King may hate that adaptation of his book but it’s the scariest movie I’ve ever seen.