This should be fun - every week, I'm going to recommend a movie available for play on Netflix instant. Hopefully this can eliminate a chunk of the 30 minutes you spend scrolling through titles. And hopefully you can appreciate my taste. Let's do this.
Firstly, Room 237 is a movie about a movie - Stanley Kubrick's The Shining. If you haven't seen it, this movie will be extremely less enjoyable. So go watch that first.
Unfortunately, I can count the horror movies I've seen on one hand - but among them, the Shining takes the cake. It's an unnerving, unsettling masterpiece and it is one of the best cinematic experiences I've ever had. After my first viewing, I knew I had only glazed the surface of the film's meanings. Through the next few viewings, I gained a better grasp of the motifs, but accepted the fact that I could never completely understand what was going on in Kubrick's mind - something that Room 237 attempts to do.
This "documentary" analyzes the film through the accounts and conspiracy theories of nine people - who claim the movie is everything from an account of Native American genocide to a confession that Stanley Kubrick helped fake the moon landing. The movie is nothing more than these people's voices - you never see their faces, and there isn't any commentary apart from what they say. These accounts, overlaid with imagery from the Shining and from other sources, make up the entirety of the movie - making the most unique "documentary" format I've ever seen.
The movie lets the viewer decide what they want to believe, never trying to prove any of the crazy things the interviewees describe. As a whole, I thought this movie was less about The Shining than it was about these interviewees - and the lengths people will go to find meaning in intricacy.
Thought provoking, funny, and even creepy at times (the last commentary really disturbed me), Room 237 (along with its wonderful score) put me in a trance of reflection and amusement. If you like the Shining, fan theories, listening to crazy people, or documentaries in general, give Room 237 a watch.
Room 237 is available for streaming on Netflix.
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