Why are there two Gradys in the Shining?
Vložit
- čas přidán 31. 05. 2024
- In the Shining we are introduced to the previous caretaker of the Overlook hotel but he is named as both "Charles" and "Delbert" Grady. Why did Stanley Kubrick add a second Grady to the story and who exactly is Charles Grady? Click the video to find out!
0:00-0:58 Intro
0:58-2:16 Charles Grady
2:16-4:41 Delbert Grady
4:41-6:22 The Scrapbook
6:22-7:21 The Articles
7:21-8:09 Two Gradys
8:10-9:00 Steven King
9:00-10:33 Conclusion
Please like and subscribe! More videos coming soon.
I always thought that Delbert went nuts because Stuart Ullman kept calling him Charles.
😂
Stuart went a "Little" Nuts. "Stuart Little", is a Rat, not a Squirrel. Oh, ya. "Crazy as a Shit House Rat." It all makes scents, now.
@@ihavefallenandicantreachmy2113 I'm going a little nuts because you wrote, "makes scents". 🤣
@@ihavefallenandicantreachmy2113 How the fuck did we go from 'The Shining' to Stewart Little? hahahaha
@@readingbetweentheframes I notice the difference in the names when I first saw the movie when it came out... I didn't think to much about it at the time I just chalked it up to typo error on the script anyone can make a mistake when writing a script or book.
From his dress and decorum it is clear Delbert Grady comes from the Roaring Twenties. The dresses of the twins supports this. Charles Grady is a later iteration of The Caretaker. Jack was to be the latest iteration but failed to "correct" his family.
Assuming I understand the general theme of the movie (and I probably don't) it wasn't simply the fact he was the caretaker that drove him insane. The Shining I think was trying to delve into the outer limits. I'm not sure it completely pulled it off. You're partly right it had a happy ending compared to most movies that are diabolical. In a way the protagonist became sort of a hero I don't think he was going to hurt anyone. That's why it was so disappointing when he did. In a way I think what Kubrick was suggesting was that evil wears a face. It wasn't his intention to hurt anyone but he felt he had to keep the legacy alive and there were also other elements. The hotel was from another time. The people associated with it were absent and it was in a remote location. He wasn't writing a book he was reminiscing the entire time about his past. He couldn't escape the past. It was also supposed to be about alcoholism. I know that was supposed to be a part of it. In fact he was supposed to be an alcoholic who couldn't escape his past as one. So there were a lot of overlap.
I thought of Jack in the twenties being not there because you don't see him in that picture until the end, only when he was fully taken by the hotel is he shown in that photo.
So I don't 100% subscribe that Grady or the twins were from the, "roaring twenties" as Jack was dressed in similar attire only when he's consumed by the hotel and earns a spot in the photo.
That was always my thought. He had been taken in by the hotel.
Not the roaring twenties. Just the 1920s
@@sage1682I agree with you, and I think the 1920’s has a significant hold on the hotel for whatever reason. It seems almost that the overlook is a stage, and the “cast” of ghosts are actors playing their eternal roles.
Everytime Jack talks to a ghost, he's looking in a mirror.
‘The Shining’ 💥💥💥
Except in the cooling room
@@Klangresonanzwhen Jack is in the locked freezer pantry the door is a semi reflective metal. Making a crude mirror.
You guys got these theories from other shining videos breaking the film down on CZcams lol
@WieDunkelHell highly polished metal door buddy !!!
Also, notice that no one except Wendy, and maybe the hotel manager, calls Jack “Jack.” All of the ghosts, such as Lloyd and Grady call him “Mr. Torrance.” This suggests, along with the differing first names of the two Grady’s, that the first Mr. Torrance and the second Mr. Torrance (Jack) are the same metaphysical entity but have differing personas or roles or personalities yet they both are stuck in the cycle of hell to relive their horrific deeds in the hotel. A very Nietzschean concept - Amor fati.
In the book there is also the added reference of calling him 'John' at certain points, within his thoughts and/or mutterings. Yes it's an average alternate for 'Jack', but also another step from that version of himself.
Jack is Not Jack anymore when He get insane.
Hes Johnny Torrance. He calls himself Johnny as He Breaks thru the door. 😉👍🏻
This is the conclusion I have come to as well. I think this is actually one of the two ideas Kubrick was laying out in this film. That's the actual plot analysis. I believe Kubrick wanted this film to be analyzed on multiple levels. The first one is the plot. Jack is almost certainly the reincarnation of some guy, with the last name Torrance, who lived in the early 20th century and was involved in the Overlook Hotel somehow, and probably murdered his family in a similar manner to Grady. The thing about the Torrance in the photograph is, we have no information about him at all, other than that he is "Mister Torrance", and the ghosts acknowledge him as such. Delbert Grady, from what we know of earlier scripts where Jack reads about him in newspaper clippings, murdered his wife and twin daughters, while Charles Grady did the same thing, only his daughters weren't twins.
The other level Kubrick intended was definitely the whole Native American genocide angle, and how the actions of these horrible white people from the early 1900s still reflect on us as a society today.
My favorite part is how delighted Jack seems to be meeting Grady. Creepy.
Yep, very creepy, but a fearless confrontation, atta boy Jack!
When Jack very first realizes who he’s talking to his voice is shaky for just a second..but yeah eventually Jack’s also like, “oh shit, this is THAT guy!”
Ok let me give some opinions: 1. Grady's full name was Charles Delbert Grady. 2. Just because the girls are played by twins doesn't mean the characters are supposed to be twins-perhaps the ghost girls made themselves appear to be the same age. 3.When Grady tells Torrance that he's always been the caretaker he's referring to Torrance's previous incarnation.
Manson probably got that a lot: "It's a real honor to meet you, Mr. Manson."
YOU are the caretaker, Mr Torrence. You have ALWAYS been the caretaker
Charles (from the 1970s) was the reincarnation of Delbert (from the 1920s). Jack himself is the reincarnation of the 1920s caretaker.
If Jack is the caretaker in the 1920s why is he a guest at the ball and not a caretaker
He's off duty. @@Alex-cw3rz
I always just assumed if you die in the Overlook, you’re given a “role” like in a never ending play.
Charles Grady became Delbert the butler.
Doctor Sleep suggests as much Jack becoming the new Lloyd.
But Delbert and other Jack were around in the 1920s.
That's what I thought too. I didn't take the date on the photo to mean that they we're all literally there that day. Every time someone does something evil and dies at the hotel they get trapped there and added to the cast of doomed ghosts.
That's very King in Yellow of you to assume
@@Progger11Jack couldn't have been there in the in the 1920s he would have been older if he did . I believe he was there in a past life
I think 💬🤔 he was when his Son was at the Bar . I believe Jack was the Bartender
It's because of the effect Halloran spoke of. The Overlook doesn't preserve the past as it was, only a shadow, or an odor, "like a burnt toast". People taken by the hotel remain not as they are, but are reincorporated in with the existing "cast of characters", if you will. The lives and deeds of these shadows are warped into the hotel's haunted pseudo-past. Grady's soul, ahem, was crammed into an "existing" waiter, damned in The Overlook's past, Jack's, into the caretaker. His first or last name will probably also be changed.
Burnt toast.
@@mackermaldrill2656 lol ty! Adjusting upon this.
I was going to say maybe the ghost scenes are supposed to be like a dream, where people from your life appear altered and morph into other people.
@@watermelonlalala like a dream realm, yes.
1921 Jack murdered the lady in room 237.
On the 4th of July.
If there are no ghosts, then Jack's use of "Delbert" instead of "Charles", as well as the inaccuracies of the "twins", might be considered an understandable error in memory after filling his mind with grisly stories he read in the scrapbook as he descends into his own madness.
On the surface, The Shining is a very effectively scary movie. But beneath the surface, you discover that there is so much more going on than you originally realized. I love that this movie is still being talked about to this very day and that new things are constantly being brought to light.
Beneath the surface you won't actually find anything more going on because it's all just unfounded fan theories that don't actually hold water any better than your biggest conspiracy theories, attempts to try and give depth to what is undeniably a very shallow adaptation of what was so much more than just a horror story. That somehow through years of Kubrick fans regurgitating total nonsense they've managed to retroactively change the film's status from flop to misunderstood masterpiece is actually quite funny.
@@beowulf1417 Why so serious?
@@alecaquino4306 edgy people trying to be edgy 🤷
@@alecaquino4306 just pointing out the reality of Kubrick's take on The Shining.
@@BobBy-zu6lo nothing to do with edgy, Kubrick fans just have a major issue with reality. He was an amazing photographer with a nuanced understanding of lenses and lighting. He managed to effectively translate that to cinematography and do some beautiful things with film, beyond that he genuinely had minimal input on all the other things that make his films the classics they're now considered to be. He's given the reverence of a high class restaurant head chef when 99% of the time he was nothing more than the restaurant manager. He may have chosen the menu, but the ingredients, the cooking and prep etc didn't see his touch.
Co-scriptwriter Diane Johnson on the film (2018 article, "Writing 'The Shining'"): There were a couple of other cuts from the script-one I found unfortunate when I finally saw the film at a screening Kubrick arranged in London a few weeks after it had actually come out. For me, the important scene, taken from Steven King’s book, is where Jack discovers a scrapbook of clippings in the boiler room of the hotel, and finds in it plots and details he needs for his writing. In King’s book, this scrapbook is the poison gift of fairy tales, which, when he accepts it, entangles the hero in consequences he will regret. In accepting material to help him earn literary glory, Jack barters his soul, becomes the creature of the hotel. This motivation scene existed in the script and I understand was filmed; it was simply taken out at the last minute for reasons of time. It would be interesting to see it restored, to know what it would add. Without the scene, which explains Jack’s transition from depressed and blocked writer to one suddenly filled with (demonic) energy, writing at great speed and piling high the pages of manuscript, his change seems abrupt and unmotivated.
Thanks for sharing this!
I'm starting to think Stephen King's book was the one that made more sense. Kubrick seems as if he was caught between portraying a man's descent into cabin fever and the other worldly elements
I'm not convinced the scrapbook scene was taken out for time. The film is much stronger without the scrapbook IMO. It leaves more questions in the viewer's mind. With the scrapbook being the source of evil, it's not as scary as knowing that evil really lives within all of us. I think Kubrick recognized this.
The scene was probably removed because it’s sorta redundant. The “sell your soul to the hotel” motif happens when Jacks would “give his soul” for glass of bear, then Lloyd appears. He sells his soul for alcohol in Kubrick’s version
If my parents had named me Delbert I'd change my name to Charles, too.
It is a good first name. Of course I may be a bit biased. lol.
I'd just have people call me Big D.
@Nospater yeah and the interview dude was charles
My mother won't go by her first name. I hate my first name, but she can't understand why. Hypocrisy.
@@k_h_nobody What’s your first name?
You just left me more baffled, there's never an end to this rabbit hole.
The shining is that one movie the more your watch it and the more you try to understand it, the more it confuses you, fascinating piece of art. Very nice analysis though, it's nice to have an answer about the 2 different Grady, it has been bothering me every time I was thinking about this movie
Stephen King has a point that reliving your life over and over could be what hell really is. Making amends for the mistakes.
Eternal life is the worst curse of all.
Relieving school would be a nightmare.
The Overlook forcing its trapped souls to reincarnate and repeat their previous mistakes is a special form of hell. It reminds me of one of theories that The Overlook itself was an portal to Limbo or some form of Purgatory, forcing its inhabitants to repeat everything over and over. And people with the Shine are resistant to the Purgatory’s effects while others like Jack Torrence is forced to relive previous sins.
Delbert was the original inhabitant while Charles is the reincarnation that was forced to repeat the cycle.
Jack is repeating the cycle this time- trying to kill his family with an ax.
Danny is the bug in the matrix i.e the overlook hotel
By the way "Fallico" as last name of the deceased young woman in room 237 in Italian is an adjective referring to male reproductive organ ...as hinted by room tapestry
One thing I have wondered about. In the novel, Wendy kills Jack with a knife. He immediately reanimates and continues chasing her saying "You killed me, you bitch". The hotel has possessed his body and can continue controlling it. It doesn't make sense that Grady would kill his wife and the girls and then himself with a shotgun. Why would he suddenly feel remorseful? I wonder if Mrs. Grady actually killed him with the shotgun and, like Jack, he immediately reanimated and continued the hunt.
What an interesting point! However, even though Wendy “killed” Jack, there was still enough of him there to interact with Danny later on. Perhaps Grady was horrified by his acts and then “finished the job?”
Family annihilators often off themselves after disposing of the family. No surprise there.
Well, he'd have had a hard time killing himself with an axe, wouldn't he? But I think there's a lot of evidence that Ullman is an unreliable narrator (to whatever degree) - maybe he gets Grady's name wrong, maybe he's gotten other details wrong (like the ages of the girls), so what's one more factual error? It's not a huge point, but slightly intriguing that a big point is made of the fact that there's no alcohol stored at the lodge in winter; somehow there was a shotgun there in 1970 but not in 1980. But some of the loose ends about the actual past at the Overlook are deliberate. Kubrick seems at pains to impress us that whatever horrors we think we can figure out, there is more and worse.
In the alternate ending of the movie, which was cut very early in the theatrical release, Ullman appears in the hospital and tells more of the story, which again seems inconsistent with what we've seen, and there's apparently a ball rolling that suggests he might be one of the evil spirits, and that he might have been there all winter. The movie is more powerful if it doesn't throw up superfluous doubts - we did actually witness some of these horrors and that there might be hope of escaping from whatever forces led to the events.
I never noticed this before but when Jack tells him "I recognize you" he mentions that he "chopped up his wife and daughter". Jack uses the singular phrase " daughter " not the plural "daughters". Both times this man's family is mentioned it is said that he has/had TWO daughters.
Had never picked up on the Charles and Delbert discrepancy before, nor his daughters not being twins. Great theory. 👍
You're not allowed to _nor_ unless first you _neither._
3 Gradys :Delbert...Trebled...Charles...Jack.
Also... Charles Grady was around in 1970. Delbert Grady in the Ballroom is the 1920s. The Latter never existed, its part of the Imagination of Jack's writing for his book. Kubrick's adaptation of Stephen King's book is quite a departure from the source material... its not a simple Ghost Story, but a story about a man writing a book about a Ghost story and what we are seeing is what he is writing. ALSO: The Applause during the End credits is the applause Jack is receiving for writing such a great book... His Wife and Boy are also alive, and he is not a Lunatic as he imagines himself in his novel...
@@JiveDadson yes you can.
Nor can you Neither, Nevertheless Evermore…
Philip Stone was also in Barry Lyndon. He was one of the few who could've claimed he was in 3 Stanley Kubrick movies.
He was in A Clockwork Orange, Barry Lyndon, and The Shining. Yeah he was in three Kubrick films
I've watched Barry Lyndon once, I plan on watching it again sometime, I'll look for him. I gotta admit it took me a few viewings of Clockwork and Shining before I realized it was the same actor.
@@coinraker6497 I never realized it was the same actor in CO and The Shining.
I believe the only other who was in three Kubrick's is Joe Turkel (The Killing, Paths of Glory, The Shining)
@@fmellish71 indeed.
I always thought that Charles was a descendent of Delbert and Charles was drawn to the hotel by the spirits of the hotel or the hotel itself. The hotel (spirits therein, possibly native American) could be an eater of souls and preys on those with weak minds who can be turned to kill for the hotel. The hotel hates those who shine because they can see what's beneath the surface. Jack Torrance is the ancestor of the "Jack" in the photo who is drawn back to the hotel as well. Danny could sense the influence of the hotel in securing the job for Jack.
Very interesting analysis.
1. Why did "Shining" Chef Halloran have no problem with the ghosts of the hotel in all the time he worked there? You'd think they'd be after him too. 2. If no literal re-incarnation took place, as this video suggests, the allegorical reincarnation suggesting generic "cycles of evil" would be the only way Kubrick could have justified having descendants of the same family look identical. If that's what it meant, the physical carbon copies were merely for the audience's benefit in discerning overall themes.
@@frankb821 Perhaps Halloran's shining wasn't as strong as Danny's. And he did succumb to Jack, suggesting Jack wasn't hallucinating but that he had the psychic ability which was passed on to Danny. The ancestor theory does hold up in that respect but it's a little bit all over the place. If Jack had the ability then he'd have been psychically connecting with Danny, though it may be that the hotel woke up his ability. Halloran's conversation with Danny about Shining suggested he knew that some things had gone on in the Overlook and specifically told Danny not to go into room 237, but that could be because he knew someone had committed suicide in there, or it could because he knew what Danny would see. I like the ambiguity of not knowing for sure.
@@frankb821 Maybe the identical appearance is allegorical to suggest the same spirit which may or may not have actually reflected the true outward appearance.
I don't think you understand the meaning of the word "ancestor".
"It must be human error Dave." - HAL 9000
There's possible confirmation of this theory in a scrapbook detail that is shown but didn't get mentioned: Grady's murdered wife was called Delphine - quite an unusual name for a caretaker's wife in the US? It can surely only be a reference, on the part of the very cine-literate Kubrick, to another classic film about a mysterious and possibly haunted hotel: Alain Resnais' La Dernier Annee a Marienbad (Last Year In Marienbad) from the early 60s, which seems to be about (it's very ambiguous) a hotel in which people are forced to relive traumatic moments of their lives over and over again, including (possibly) the male protagonist's murder of the woman he loved - played, iconically, by art movie favourite, the French actress DELPHINE Seyrig.
Excellent theory and dot-connecting, my Friend! 👍🏾 I believe you *_nailed_* that one.
To me, the hotel simply gets a hold of you. And gives a role to play in its quest to consume more people.
It can also get a hold of your thoughts so it knows what/who you know. So it distorts it in a way it can consume you.
Note also the color red at certain places in the movie, the bathroom here for example, clothing, etc. Right before Grady crashes into Jack and spills drinks all over him, he had swerved to avoid colliding with a lady in a white gown...she also had a red handprint down low on the gown....definitely signals for sure.
I don't know if this is a coincidence (but is anything a coincidence in "The Shining"???) but the lady with the bloody handprint on the back of her dress reminds me of a scene in the movie version of "Carrie" from a few years earlier. After Carrie first gets her period in the shower and there's a terrible scene, the gym teacher who helps Carrie is talking with the school principal in his office and there's a blood handprint on her white pants. What it might mean I don't know, but I can't help but think there's some connection between the bloody handprints in the two movies, both of which are based on Stephen King stories.
You are confusing this with the sixth sense.
I love Jack's smile when he looks in the mirror 2:39 and recognizes Mr. Grady 😊
Fascinating! I’ve stayed overnight in the Stanley Hotel rm. 224, I think, just down the hall from 217 (which I believe was Mr. King’s room when he started compiling ideas for The Shining). I’ve seen the movie dozens of times and this never even occurred to me. 😳. Great video!
Mostly agree with this. They become or are "part" of the Overlook, and Grady all but says that. "I should know. I've always been here." It's a beautiful and arguably perfect scene. I would probably not describe it as 2 Jacks and 2 Gradys. It's Jack and Grady. Jack's on his way to his ever was and ever will be, Grady's already there. The confrontation is sublime because to some of us in the audience, we'd be less confrontational and more paralytic with terror in "meeting" Grady. But Jack's immersed, and strangely yet aptly comfortable. Still, the viewer can't help but be terrified. The ghost is confronted, but does not dissipate or back down. From then on we're in in spine shiver territory. We're touching the marrow of the Overlook and it is speaking to Jack. I would say I would nominate the confrontation scene in the bathroom as one of the best scenes in any film ever.
You described exactly my feeling about t his scene, which I have always felt was one of the most terrifying movie scenes ever made. But I would never have been able to express the reason why as well as you did.
I've always believed that Delbert is basically the Overlook's version of Grady and Charles is the world's version, same as Jack. Grady never calls him Jack, so it's possible that his ghost has always gone by a different name in the hotel. If the caretaker is always the caretaker, and Jack has always been there, then Charles has as well. In fact, Charles and Jack have both been alive a shorter amount of time than the Overlook ghost versions of themselves as proven by the photo. Perhaps it's possible that the hotel is responsible for perpetuating the cycle of violence by effectively creating these monsters and trapping them in the hotel until they can be born and fulfill their murderous destiny. The pull of the hotel is so strong that it defies time itself and can hold a soul there before it's even born.
What an interesting idea! I love it!
I think the scene is, in part, a formulaic scene where one character confronts another one and says, "Who are you? What are you doing here? I don't believe you are just an innocent person. You're lying." And so on. Basically, someone threatens someone else.
In an interview with Michel Ciment, Kubrick himself explains that Jack was a reincarnation of a former hotel employee.
Where'd you find that interview?
@@johnkeckYou may find it in the book "Kubrick: The Definitive Edition" by Michel Ciment. You can also find it online but I'm afraid CZcams won't let me post a link to the comments. Try searching for the following phrase on Google (without quotes):
kubrick on the shining an interview with michel ciment
Jack is a fiction writer, who is planning to write a book while staying at the Overlook. When Olman told Jack about Charles Grady, the former Caretaker, murdering his family, that gave Jack the the theme of his new book. The movie is really showing Jack's novel, which explains the two different Jacks as well as the two different Gradys. Delbert Grady was not a Caretaker during the winter, but a waiter during the summer months. In Jack's book, the Grady twins, (not 8 and 10) appearently hated living in the isolated and not really kid friendly hotel for the open season. Remember, the Overlook has a staff wing for the employees to stay during those months. Jack's novel is baced on the Charles Grady murders, with a ghost story effect, just as he boasted about his wife Wendy being a big fan of such stories.
Yes. Rob Ager covers this and has us observe the two colored jackets Jack wears; one for real, author Jack, the other for novel character Jack.
@@KutWrite do you have a link to his video/article about this? big fan of his work but haven't seen that theory by him yet
@@verifiedbadvibe8124: No, I'd have to go to his channel and scan the video titles. I think you could find it as easily doing the same. I think it had to do with "Two Jacks" - something like that.
Good work mate, after watching The Shining for the first time many years on TCM and watching these videos and Rob Ager break it down you realise how much thought went into this movie and Kubrick is even bigger legend then he already is, I don’t wanna sound like a old bloke but modern movies lack this detail I think Christopher Nolan for example is one of the few modern directors that still put effort and thought into his movies
I never seen the Shining on TCM but they do show other Kubrick movies though.
Interesting theory, or it could be that the guy didn't care enough to remember Delbert's real name and thought it was "Charles." Later when Jack correctly calls him Delbert rather than Charles and says he recognized him from the newspapers reveals a very sinister twist that Jack had planned to kill Wendy and Danny all along in the Overlook hotel.
killed that analysis brotha
"More allegorical"
Bingo.
I like that Kubrick refused to let Jack Torrance off the hook like King did, by having him totally possessed by the hotel when he goes on his rampage. Heck, King replaces "he" with "it". King wants to keep that optimistic perspective by retaining some sort of core goodness in Torrance in that it's not *really*him smashing that mallet, or axe - it's the hotel wearing his body.
No such escape clause is present in Kubrick's film.
i'd never noticed there are actually 2 first names given for Grady although every time i saw the movie I'd always have the uncanny feeling like i'd misremembered Grady's name. at the beginning thinking "charles? i thought his name was delbert or something?" and then vice versa later on, and never pieced it together they actually change the name. i'm sure that disorientation is exactly what Kubrick was going for. but i had noticed before the girls weren't twins in Ullman's story, and how it happened in 1970 with no indication they were British, even though Delbert and the twins seem extremely British and like they're from the 1950s or earlier, so i'm glad other people are pointing it out. altho Diane Arbus's photo of twin girls which inspired Kubrick was taken in 1967 in New Jersey, so maybe there were still a few pairs of twin girls circa 1970 in the USA walking around looking like Victorian ghosts. still, Delbert and the twins aren't what you imagine when Ullman tells the story. this is one of the very few things i think Mike Flanagan got right in Dr Sleep in showing he actually thought about and understood this one aspect of the original movie, is that when Danny goes back to the Overlook in the Gold Room he sees his dad, but Jack isn't Jack Torrance anymore, he's Lloyd the bartender now. implying that "lloyd the bartender", like "Delbert Grady", are just sort of roles or archetypes from the hotel's history which people like Jack, or Charles Grady, get consumed by and integrated into, instead of the ghosts being a literal personification of a single individual human from a specific era with that name. or maybe as new souls are consumed by the hotel they take the roles of older ones, merging their own identities with the earlier ones
I always took it that Charles influenced or possessed Jack into killing his family like he did and he was just one of many ghosts who were evil or murderer's of the hotel... Let's keep it simple people. Lol and as for the man in the pic at the end is just an evil man who looked like Jack ironically to give that creepy feeling
I think the entire movie acts out the novel Jack is writing. Jack wrote a novel about the winter he spent as a caretaker at the hotel, adding lots of horror to make it more commercially viable, and to work through the guilt he felt about being a bad father. In Jack's real world there were no ghosts, no killings. The continuity "errors" in the movie are Kubrick's deliberate clues to show that none of it is real. That's how writing goes. "I'll put the painting here; no, I'll put it there." "The tricycle is red; no, it's blue." "The girls are twins; no, they're eight and ten." "I'll call Grady Delbert; wait, didn't I call him something else before?" And Jack was too lazy to check. He was not a dull boy.
I think this is the single best analysis of the movie. Thanks
At this point it would be an outlier opinion to think that Kubrick just wanted to make a scary movie.
Did you find it scary? My friends and I all saw it as a dark comedy.
@@duderama6750dark comedy supposed to make you laugh not be scared.
@@Thespeedrap
I didn't find it scary at all.
I always thought the photo at the end was all the victims of the Overlook, never thought about two different Grady)# before
I think Kubrick saw the ending of Polanski's 1965 film 'Replusion' and thought: that's a great ending. I'll steal it. Because only GOOD ARTISTS borrow. A GREAT ARTIST steals. Does it make complete sense? I'm not sure.
Love the well researched, grounded analysis!
This is the best take on this I've heard to date. Seems really plausible. If Kubrick were only alive to confirm or deny. =)
One thing about the location of the Overlook that you may have missed is that it is in Colorado not far from Denver which is about as close to the center of the Nation as you can get. That is why Denver is such a major hub for all sorts of communications companies and military activities.
Just as I was scrolling aimlessly, and happened to find the title, I decided to watch. Needless to say, I am now a subscriber after just a few minutes of your analysis..... YOU ARE GOOD. 💯💫🌟
Best take I've seen on "the Shining" but I'd say not "the past of their past selves" but "past of their fathers, fathers' past selves". "Sins of the farther" type of idea.
Stanley Kubrick explained, the film is “supposed to suggest a kind of evil reincarnation cycle, where he [Jack] is part of the hotel’s history, just as in the men’s room, he’s talking to the former caretaker [Grady], the ghost of the former caretaker, who says to him, ‘you are the caretaker; you’ve always been the caretaker, I should know I’ve always been here’”.
in an interview the screenwriter who worked with Kubrick said that Stanley tried to do something magical with the film that past, present and future events happened in the same timeline about the deleted scene he said that it was one more piece of the puzzle but that Kubrick was sad that the public asked for answers and then were overwhelmed with them shelley commented that it was a mistake to remove that hospital scene because it made it clear that ullman was not what he seemed and the importance of the yellow ball in the film
Ever heard of punctuations?
Why what was left out
@@morpheus6749 what is the point?
@@carlosmeelopatchen9773 What's the point of writing anything on a public forum?
Whoa, well I never heard of the hospital scene, or the yellow ball before, & that has my interests PEAKED! I fell into a rabbit hole, as there's this huge multi-part examination of this movie on a channel called Truth Seeker or something like that. It was great, a lot of work went into it. A labor of love and respect, really. & they covered SO MUCH there, like, I've never seen anything like it lol. They were stopping to look for the art on the walls & showing how much the crap in the backgrounds wasn't just "crap" at all. But they broke down what is IN THE MOVIE. Not anything taken out, that I can recall. Def not this stuff! Thanks very much for mentioning this lost context, I'll be looking for it 😁
I always saw the hotel as a structure haunted by pure evil. With Jack's first interview, the demons of the hotel quickly began to possess him...as they knew they had the next person to perpetuate the evil/killing. Jack slowly entered into his possessed state and was able to interact more and more with evil in control. Of course Danny was able to foresee the evil due to his gift. Halloran tried to explain it as the smell of burnt toast that lingers. Halloran was able to keep the two worlds separated until called back by Danny. Danny was a threat to the evil world possessing the hotel and the ghosts readily pushed Jack to quickly correct this situation. Jack failed to kill his family but he did kill Halloran, appeasing the evil souls residing in the hotel. His soul was placed in the trophy picture with the date that likely coincided with the possession of the hotel. Wendy was likely seeing the past guests in a poltergeist manner...evil is as evil can do and will do. Danny could see them because of his gift...the shining.
Well yeah you could see it in Jack's Eyes when he was driving up there with Wendy and Danny that Little by Little the Hotel was Drawing him in .
Makes sense. Wendy started to see the ghosts once Halloran blood was spilled. The murder probably fueled the full force of the evil within the hotel.
That’s actually a pretty good Kubrick impression!
Seeing the movie from this perspective, the twins can be interpreted as a motif, reinforcing the idea of Jack and Grady having "doubles".
Finally! I've been lookin for an answer to this for years and this sounds perfectly plausible...thank you... great work ...subscribed!!!
P.s you should do a video debunking thst ridiculous body in the river of blood theory.
Great video! I have always wondered why Gradys two girls are referred to as 8 and 10 and not twins. I think Kubrick deliberately filmed this movie in a way that it is always going to be theorized and open to interpretation. Cheers ✌
Delbert's daughters were twins (1921). Charles Grady's daughters (1970) were not.
@@stephenwalker2924 so confusing lol. Thank you!
Or things change during production, Kubrick was influenced by the portrait of twins that his peer had made, and changed the daughters to twins.
Cycles of abuse and violence.
No twins in the novel so this one of the correct things Kubrick got right.
My son's name is Truman. Maybe I used The Shining to pull that name out of the lore. Or it is a huge coincidence. Great video.
For those stuck on the Grady family's accents----East Coast blue-blood families often retained much of their ancestors' accents going back to the British Founders, through both family contact, i.e., picking it up from relatives as children, and in private "finishing" schools, which taught kids to speak with this old-school grand manner. Many actors even developed blue-blood accents for their craft. Vincent Price, John Hillerman, and Jonathon Harris, respectively, were born and raised in St. Louis; a Dallas suburb in Texas, and the Bronx, NY, but they were classically trained actors, though they have been mistakenly given UK lineages in entertainment media. Katharine Hepburn and Bette Davis also come from "old money" blue-blood New England families, so they often sounded like Brits even when not playing them on screen----though it doesn't always take. Jimmy Stewart's from Philadelphia's Main Line families, and he didn't pick up any accent.
Great point well made.
Baloney. The movie actors are phony, or they might have been trained to do English plays. Never take a Hollywood movie as an example of "the way it was".
@@watermelonlalala everything including you! is a reflection of what everything was.
The actor is actually British and was used by Kubrick often. Philip Stone was also in Indian Jones and the Temple of Doom and Coronation Street.
My point doesn't concern whether he's British, but was to address those who wondered why characters identified as Americans---not Brits----Americans would have British accents, and my point is that New England blue-blood accents often are confused with British accents.
An interesting take. Thanks for taking the time to put this together. I gave me pause for thought.
You did something here I want to point out. When you first show the scene between Jack and Grady, you show the scene at the angle with Grady's back to the camera. Starting at 7:58, when you mention reincarnation, you show that Grady and Jack have changed places with Jack's back to the camera. I've heard some theories about mirrors and reflections and how Kubrick uses them in The Shining. The way you did that helps me understand just as there was more than one Grady, there must have been one than one Jack.
The film "reflects" this in one scene when Jack stares at his reflection when he's sitting in bed. The camera shows Jack but we later realize the camera is focusing on Jack's reflection and not Jack directly. My statement doesn't prove anything but its just something I noticed.
I have a theory that jack and grady is the reincarnation of the soul of the hotel caretaker and in the bathroom scene the evil spirit gets into grady reminds jack that he must correct his family
I always thought that Stuart Ullman got the details of Grady's story wrong because of a combination of the time that had passed since the murders, and the fact that Ullman didn't really know or care about the personal details of the Winter caretakers at the Overlook. He wasn't going to be dealing with them at all, other than their initial meet-and-greet, and possibly when all of the staff returns to the Overlook when Winter ends, and there's an overlap with the caretaker being there with the rest of the staff for a short time before leaving to go back home.
Because Wendy hallucinated both scenes and forgot Gradys first name? It explains why Jack never told her about the Grady incident, it wasn't part of the real interview, just the part Wendy imagined, so the real Jack didn't know anything about it.
I had always noticed this in the film and I had always figured that the names Charles and Delbert were belonging to the same person, like the full name would be "Charles Delbert Grady" for example
I had always figured that in some way until seeing that scrapbook thing in the video
I actually thought the same until I discovered the scrapbook as well
Or the hotel preferred Delbert and have him an English accent
In the novel Jack finds a huge file in the basement of the hotel, and then calls Ullman blackmailing Ullman about writing a tell all book about the shady history of the Overlook. It was also in the script but never fully filmed.
The film also changed Ullman's character. In the film, he seems like a nice, pleasant person. In the novel he's a huge asshole who doesn't even want to hire Jack, but is overruled by the hotel owners. One of the big reasons being he was an alcoholic. This was omitted from the film, along with most of the subtext about alcoholism, and thus one of the big reasons why King has rather famously not been a big fan of the film (although in recent years he's appreciated it more).
Only about halfway through yet, although considering the thorough nature and well presented information in this video, I must assume you are familiar with Rob Ager of the Collative Learning channel here on youtube. I can't help but think he would love this video. I bet he has been here already lol.
If my assumption is wrong however, then I urge you and anyone reading this to visit his channel and website. As you scroll through his video content you'll see why.
Great fun speculation. I really enjoyed that short journey. I didn't know about the movie scrapbook with such details. Adds another dimension
Many have the theory that nothing was real and everything was the product of Jack or Wendy's imagination, but in the interviews that Kubrick gave, he said that the events of the film were real, even the ghosts.
They had to be real. Otherwise who let Jack out of the pantry?
No, he didn't. In fact Kubrick did not believe in the supernatural.
@@morpheus6749 what we're discussing is the internal logic of the film, not the personal beliefs of the director.
@@morpheus6749 the funny thing is that kubrick did not believe in life after death but the movie hints at reincarnation
@@tophers3756 The problem was that Kubrick removed many chilling scenes from the film because of his beliefs.
I think the simplest explaination is that Mr. Ullman missremembers the details and has possibly combined two or more different stories. He looks uncomfortable relating the anecdote and probably never thinks about it unless forced to. He never met Grady and likely heard it verbally from more than one source that may have distrted details.
I read in a comment that the delberts are called charles of affection in some states of usa
Nope. Charles Grady and Delbert Grady are Two different People... First of all... Charles Grady is a real person, and committed his Murder Suicide in 1970. And he had two daughters 8 & 10. Mr. Ullman was alive and around when this happened. I doubt he would have forgotten the name so easily, or even details about it, as it would have been the topic of many conversations for the past 10 years while he was running the Overlook Hotel. Secondly... the Ballroom scene with DELBERT Grady is taking place in the 1920s. Which means its a completely different time, and to pile onto that, its DELBERT Grady, and his children are Twins. The most Simplest Explanation is there are NO GHOSTS in this movie, and what Jack is seeing (and we are Seeing) is Jack's Imagination as he writes his book.
@@annoyboyPictures Many have the theory that nothing was real and everything was the product of Jack or Wendy's imagination, but in the interviews that Kubrick gave, he said that the events of the film were real, even the ghosts.
@@carlosmeelopatchen9773 When it comes to the "Unreliable Narrator" format, the creators such as the Director, the Writers, the Cast and Crew, tend to lie and hide the truth about the film when giving public interviews so as not to ruin the ambiguity of the film. Case in Point: American Psycho - Brett Easton Ellis even remained vague and ambiguous when asked whether Patrick Bateman was actually a real person in the movie, and not just the concoction of someone's mentally ill thoughts... (which it turned out to be in the end).
@@annoyboyPictures but how do you explain danny's glow if it were a product of jack's imagination and his novel how he knew about his gift in the movie danny is never shown with tony in the presence of jack
The shining is 2 stories.
The first story is the one of the author and family moving to the hotel while the author gets some ideas for characters.
The 2nd story is the manuscript that was written while at the hotel.
the actor was part of Kubrick's troop- Phiip Stone, he was Alex De'Large's Dad in 'A Clockwork Orange'
That’s actually the image on the left, in the thumbnail
This was a creepy movie in all senses of the word. I first saw it in a theater when I was young. I didn’t understand that Jack was abusing Danny (and Wendy). What really shocked me besides the woman in the bathtub was when they showed what he had been writing the entire time, “All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy”! That disturbed 😦 me a lot. I guess that was the point of it. I read the book which I thought was much better. I’ve read almost all of Stephen King’s books but I thought Carrie was the best adaptation of his book. Not to take anything away from your review of the movie but there is another CZcams channel that has “Everything Wrong With The Shining” It’s very interesting and gives another perspective.
I dare someone to make a movie nowadays that have so many puzzle pieces to be interpreted 42 years later
Jesus , iv watched this film so many times and never noticed the scrapbook once ,
It's obvious. Delbert Grady was the former butler of the Overlook Hotel during the 1920s and 30s, on that was reincarnated as "Charles " Grady, killed his wife and daughters before committing suicide due to cabin fever induced mental breakdown plus the evil influence of the Overlook Hotel's sentient power that possessed him. Just as Jack was a reincarnation of a previous Caretaker of the hotel decades before.
Exactly
I thought that the guy in the bathroom, being an attendant, is representative of what happens to those who are caught up in the reincarnation cycle of evil that exists in the overlook hotel. Being a servant of the overlook, or responding to the evil there and becoming influenced by it, forever traps you there in a type of hell, where, by doing it's evil business, you become nothing more than a pawn or servant, perhaps being nothing more than a bathroom attendant for an eternity.
Job security 🤡
Wow! Thanks for that! I learned a lot. I've seen it many many times and never noticed the scrapbook.
Brilliant. I have watched many videos analyzing Kubricks " The Shining" and this is an intriguing one. Thank you
This is probably the best theory of the shining that I’ve seen so far, and I’ve seen most of the videos on CZcams. So I guess when Jack Torrance met Delbert Grady, and talked to him in the bathroom, that was the spirit of the same Delbert Grady that basically possessed Charles Grady to do the same thing that Delbert already did to his family. There can’t be just one spirit that is reincarnating from one Grady into Jack Torrance, because Charles Grady was alive the same time that Jack Torrance was alive. At some point there must’ve been a couple of revengeful Native American spirits that decided to possess a few people from the overlook. Once those people murdered others and then took their own lives, For whatever reason they reincarnated into other people who were called back to the house to keep repeating the murders. I guess when Charles Grady offed himself, that enabled Delbert’s spirt to roam the overlook. I think the bigger question here is are we actually talking about reincarnation or are we talking about possession? Are the spirits actually reincarnating into people, or are they simply spirits that are possessing people? Honestly I think possession would be more plausible, even though Jack Torrance looked a lot like the old caretaker in the photo towards the end of the movie.
*_"I say you are the true Messiah, Lord, and I should know, I've followed a few!"_*
This is dope. I never knew about the scrapbook scene. It explains a lot & I can see what that scene & the ending were cut. Makes the movie more mysterious..
You can go down a super tenuous rabbit hole for 10 minutes to explain why and how Grady's name suddenly and inexplicably changes, or you can just accept that Kubrick made an uncharacteristic continuity error in rewriting the script during filming.
I wanted to tell you, this is really the most insightful commentary on this mysterious film. There’s a lot out there and some of it is quite interesting. Some of it, like the “Wendy Theory” fails miserably but to each his own. I loved your other video with a great deal of insight. I think few people realize who and what they’re dealing with when it comes to Stanley Kubrick. There’s almost always a ton more to things than is immediately apparent.
The contents of the scrapbook were very interesting, thanks for the post.
Yeah. I'd like to see the whole thing!
Another theory is that while the Grady tragedy didn't happen too long before the events of the film, Ullman is already misremembering the facts or possibly never even paid too much attention to the details in the first place. He shows an encyclopedic knowledge of the Overlook's history when giving the tour, but when it comes to the darker aspects, the details are unimportant to him and he really only knows those stories in a nutshell. This ties into the Overlook/USA metaphor, as the country also has a long-standing habit of reworking, rewriting and having a selective memory when it comes to its own history. (Christopher Columbus's "discovery" of America, the origins of Thanksgiving, some schools downplaying slavery in Civil War history lessons, etc.)
And Jack quickly checking the back of Grady's head for the gunshot wound is comedy gold!
There's a downplay of slavery in general, with a microcosm of blame on US. Any research becomes both dire and matrix breaking, esp w.r.t. Muslim slave trade and current open trade slave markets in Libya, thanks to Hillary.
Extremely well done video! I thoroughly enjoyed it.
Random theory, I think that when Jack dies at the end (spoiler alert) that he goes to hell, and said hell for Jack, is simply reliving the overlook. Meaning, restart the movie. The movie is both Jack alive, and Jack in hell, as it's a closed loop, thus why he's on the picture at the end. He's always been there and always will be, because it's a closed loop
Before they go into the bathroom, Grady spills some advocat (made from eggs) on Jack's jacket. Jack quite impishly and deliberately stains the butler's jacket in return by patting him on the back. The butler has a British accent and Jack even calls him "Jeeves" (the servant from the Jeeves and Wooster books). So there is a master and servant dynamic here, but like in the books, the servant has ways of getting what he wants. In the bathroom scene, first Jack seems at first to have the upper hand, but slowly, insidiously, the butler takes control and is the one in control and manipulating Jack. Just before he bumps into Grady, Jack blurts out the "White Man's Burden" to Lloyd the Bartender. This is the title of a poem by British writer Rudyard Kipling, in which he encouraged America to take up the civilizing endeavor of colonialism after our acquisition of the Philippines in the wake of the Spanish American War. Anyway, getting back to the theme of mutual staining and "egging on", one of the character Peter Sellers plays in Dr. Strangelove is named "Group Captain Mandrake". Mandrake root is a deadly poison. The American nation and subsequent empire has it's roots in the British Empire. What was Kubrick saying about the legacy of the British Empire on the American one? Of course, Kubrick being a pessimist of humanity, he would extend this critique out to all empires and all of humanity throughout history.
There is much going on in the two red bathroom scenes, the two Gold Room scenes, and the two Room 237 scenes. Two Jacks and two Gradys as well. Everything seems to be doubled into pairs in the story.
Perhaps as in FMJ, "twins"= duality of man. You could expand that Theme to his other movies too.
I know this is an old comment, but I recently rewatched The Shining and have gone down the analysis rabbit hole so here I am.
I just wanted to correct one thing. Jack mentions "white man's burden" during his first interaction with Lloyd, when it's just the two of them. Not in the later scene of the party in the Gold Room. In that scene Lloyd tells him his money is no good there and to "drink up." (Though we know all alcohol had been removed from the hotel)
The concept, in other analysis of the film, is of overlooking evils. Like how you overlook the fact mentioned in the film that the hotel was built on an indian burial ground, and that several indian attacks were repelled with unknown loss of life. How Wendy overlooks Jack's alcoholic abuse of her son. How Jack's own analysis of himself overlooks how recent his abuse, and alcoholism was Wendy tells the psychiatrist it was just a couple of months before but Jack tells the bartender it was years. We overlook how when Wendy asks about movie stars visiting the hotel we overlook the classism in the answer when she is told all the best people visit. I was surprised on first seeing the movie how both Jack, and Grady use the n word regarding Halloran. But I suspect a lot of people overlook it. These days the word is censored from the movie even though it's central to the theme of the movie. We overlook movies edited for language are really censored for the ideas the language conveys. That shot you show of the scrapbook literally overlooks the scrapbook of evil. Kubrick's last film, maybe his last message to his audience, is that we overlook evil with eyes wide open but shut them to the evil. That we are complicit in evil. Like how the media is complicit in the evil of today by repeatedly wondering how people can believe evil utter nonsense repeatedly overlooking the conclusion that the people don't believe it but are complicit in it same as a bank robber doesn't believe his own alibi even though it's nonsense, and he repeats it over, and over.
Look up the wendy theory
Only point of order is that Kubrick's last film was Eyes Wide Shut. And if you don't count that because he didn't live to screening, Full Metal Jacket was after The Shining.
But that's very much picking nits.
The overlook hotel
Just came to say I watched the movie today on HBOMax and the word wasn't censored out
when jack says "white man's burden" it's so creepy and awesome. i'm a native american myself and i like the idea of a native ghost taking control of jack in that moment. (since the hotel was built on a native graveyard.)
plus.. ooooh what a nice voice, handsome and talks about the shining?! 😸 awesome video!
Jack starts writing a novel while staying at the hotel. He’s a writer.
He’s using that story as inspiration for his novel. Jack just doesn’t remember his first name. But we’re watching his story, it’s just that a story.
It’s why we get the random unlit scenes (the hotel shines when it’s depicted in Jack’s story) with the real Jack typing the story we’re seeing.
I've recently gone down the rabbit hole of trying to interpret Kubrick's The Shining, and the two Gradys has nagged at me just as much as who exactly freed Jack from the freezer. I think this is as good of an interpretation as I have heard thus far and puts my mind a bit more at ease. Thank you.
The video is wrong, but believe what you like.
@@MarkLewis... care to elaborate?
@@BeersAndBeatsPDX I did... Rather verbosely, lol, but as you requested) in elaboration. Just find my post.
Jack freed himself. Those walk in freezer doors have a failsafe mechanism that prevents people from being locked in. You just push the knob that Jack has in his hand in that scene.
@@duderama6750 He was in a dry-goods pantry not a freezer and a screwdriver was in the door preventing the safety release.
Grady's ghost in the horror novel the real Jack Torrance was writing, let out character Jack Torrance from the storage room.
The movie you watch is the book that Jack wrote based on the story that he was told about Charles Grady in the interview. That's why the name changed from Charles to Delbert and the girls changed to Twins other then sisters of 8&10(he had to leave out the real people he was basing the story on).Jack Torrens took the job at Overlook to get solitude so he could write his first book but little did he know that he'd be given the bases for his book in his interview with the hotel manager. It's brilliant😎👍
Brilliant🎉
I really wish someone would do a video analysis on the character Bill Watson. I've always felt there was something sort of mysterious and haunting about him. Like his presence is saying more than his silence.
The way he says “fine” is constantly in my mind. Most passive aggressive agreement ever.
@@liamshanley_21 How about Scatman Crothers character Dick Hallorann?He seems to know alot too! He called Danny Doc without foreknowledge of his mother calling him that! And being able to talk without moving his lips to Danny. 🤨🤔🙄🕵
I see him as an example of go along to get along, and before you know you're stuck.
He does look like the domesticated native in the mix, accepted yet seething...🧂🇺🇸
@@SuperMarioBrosIII your comment makes it seem like you are unaware that hallorann obviously had the gift of 'shining' just like Danny. He literally says it in the scene where he's talking to Danny.
@@ericbuzzard2041 I'm aware of Halloranns gift ther shinning and him telling Danny he would have long conversations with his grandmother for hours without moving there lips. I merely meant his character being explored or being done more in depth like the rest of the characters. I know he was also in the Twilight Zone movie Kick The Can. 😀🙄📽🙏
Subbed & Liked! Enjoyed the video! Good work!
Wow you dug really deep to come up with this. I didn't even know there was a scrapbook at all!
Really appreciate your energy and insights!! For being a young guy, you’re more intellectually mature than your age. Fabulous breakdown of the entire film. Please watch another complex great; “The Ninth Configuration.”
This makes sense, actually. I have watched this movie, and read this novel several times. They are indeed one person in the novel, however, I agree they are two in the movie. While I think too much has been made of "Kubrick was SO meticulous, he NEVER would have made continuity errors" of his most ardent fans, I agree this is NOT one of them. It is evidenced by the fact that Mr. Ullman specifies the ages of Charles Grady's daughters being 8 and 10. For Ullman to specify ages, and then show them clearly as twins (who would be the same age), I agree that Kubrick was telling the audience these were two different Grady family continuums. He would NOT have made that type of glaring continuity error. King made a good point: Hell may very well be reliving the horrors of your past
Agree 100%
The idea of Charles being the real life version and Delbert being the Overlooks possessed also weirdly makes Jacks comedic use of "Here's Johnny!" fit, perhaps he has become John Torrance, though this could merely be grasping at straws.
Thank you my friend and humble narrator for your interesting analysis. I enjoyed it very much.
Please subscribe and turn on the notifications as I have more coming!
I interpreted as the current hotel manager got the name and family details wrong because he didn’t really care and was passing along the anecdote “whisper down the lane” style. I thought it was supposed to show that all the assurances that they checked Grady’s employment references and record were also done with a lack of diligence. Potentially, Grady used a partial false name when applying for the caretaker position. Again, just a take.
Yes, I knew there were two Gradys just like there are two Jacks. Their lives repeat like a mistake that lives in other versions of themselves.
Great job on this. Insightful
My theory is in the bathroom scene when they meet, Grady is stuck there in the hotel. He's in purgatory. The Red representing Hell, and white Salvation. Jack has just joined him. Jack is now too far gone to recover.
Also Jack said to Grady, "You chopped up your wife and daughter", singular. Don't know if it has any relevance or Nicholsan just misspoke the line and Kubrick let it go.
I noticed that too.
@@LawnBunny777 Ditto for me!
Unlikely. Kubrick was a perfectionist & shot many repetitions of each scene, even one where Jack just crosses the street. Nicholson got frustrated with it, saying "Perfectionist doesn't mean perfect" afterwards, But Kubrick did it to get the exact right tone, & also to make sure that the film is working on the unconscious level. He called films "controlled dreams."
Jack also says he "chopped them up into little bits." This clearly goes beyond what Ullman told him - and when we see the apparent aftermath of their murder, they are clearly victims of an axe murder but relatively intact. It's important that Torrance (the wannabe novelist) is taunting Grady, and laying a bit of a trap right out of cop fiction. If Grady shows emotion, or corrects a maddening falsehood, he has to confess that he's a murderer, and to confess that he's also a ghost. Grady doesn't take the bait.
What's it mean? 1) It seems to impugn Jack as a writer - his idea isn't original enough and making it more gruesome doesn't make it more shocking; 2) It seems to challenge our assumptions about ghosts. Most of them are in ghost form for some specific reason that advances the story, and here is Grady, whose motives are fairly opaque. 3) For all of the clues that encourage us to weigh every detail, the issue of whether he's real or not doesn't even change the fact that the idea of him contributes to Jack's madness.