The Shining
The Shining mistake picture

Continuity mistake: While breaking down the bathroom door with the axe, Jack repeatedly strikes and damages the right hand panel, but as he turns away from the door (when he hears the snow-cat) both left and right panels have been damaged.

Continuity mistake: When Jack finally dies and you see him lie down on the hedges, his back is flat on the hedge, but when you see him face front, his back is about five feet away from the hedge.

The Shining mistake picture

Continuity mistake: At the beginning when Danny is talking to his Mom and eating a sandwich, the sandwich gets about 5 bites smaller in a split second. (00:04:45)

The Shining mistake picture

Revealing mistake: In the first scene, when Nicholson is driving to the Overlook, the shadow of a helicopter can be seen at the bottom right. This is only visible in the un-matted VHS print and fullscreen DVD. (00:01:05)

Revealing mistake: Wendy has a baseball bat in her hand and Jack is trying to get the baseball bat. When Wendy hits him over the head, the baseball bat bends.

Continuity mistake: In the initial overhead shot of the hotel the hedge maze is not there though later on it is shown quite close to the hotel. (00:02:45 - 01:42:30)

Visible crew/equipment: In the final shot of the opening sequence (before "the Interview" title shot), at the top of the frame, you will see the helicopter blades twirling. (Visible on fullscreen DVD and VHS.) (00:02:43)

Continuity mistake: When Jack breaks the door to the bathroom and reaches in to unlock, Wendy cuts him. Later there is no blood on the knife.

Continuity mistake: Wendy comforts Jack after he has had his nightmare. His hairstyle keeps differing depending on the angle focusing on him.

Sacha

Continuity mistake: In the beginning when Wendy is talking to the doctor, Wendy lights a cigarette, seconds later the paper has burned almost to the filter.

Continuity mistake: When Wendy is looking through all the typed sheets where Jack has typed 'All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy', you can see that they are getting disorganised, and when Jack sneaks up on her, she gets a fright and puts them down in an untidy pile. However, in the next shot, they are in a relatively neat pile again in the tray.

Continuity mistake: When Jack is typing and is interrupted by Wendy, he takes out the sheet and tears it and with no replacement. In the next shot there is a new one on the typewriter.

ozwal13

The Shining mistake picture

Continuity mistake: When Danny is playing alone in the corridor, with his toy cars and trucks, in the overhead shot, the little vehicles are set up on the orange and brown pattern, as the ball roles to him down the center brown path in the carpet's sextagon pattern. However, in Danny's close-up, when the ball is in front of him, all the little toy vehicles are now set up (still the same way) on the opposite side of the carpet's distinct pattern, as he also faces the opposite way. This mistake has absolutely nothing to do with the ghosts of The Overlook moving the ball.

Factual error: At the end of the movie there is the chase scene through the hedge maze in the dead of winter in Colorado. While Jack Nicholson runs after his son in a winter setting you cannot see their breath in what would be the cold night air.

Continuity mistake: When Hallorann is showing Wendy & Danny around after they first arrive at the hotel, they walk through the kitchen towards the camera & into the freezer door to the left of the screen. You can see the kitchen still visible in the background. When they leave the freezer (after Hallorann calls Danny "Doc"), the background is completely different & the kitchen is not visible. This is because they have actually filmed a different door on the opposite side of the corridor. They then walk towards camera again & back into the kitchen they have just walked through.

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Suggested correction: This sort of discontinuity is deliberate. The layout of the Overlook is intended to make no sense.

The Shining mistake picture

Continuity mistake: As Danny is writing 'redrum' on the bathroom door, the lampshade on the nightstand light is askew. A moment later, when Jack is knocking down the door with the axe, the lampshade has somehow straightened itself out. (01:32:40)

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Suggested correction: This along with other subtle movements and the microscopic misplacement of everything inside the Overlook is meant to snap back to its former or appear "off" for no reason other than it gives the viewer an uncomfortable and uneasy feeling.

Continuity mistake: When Wendy gets jack in to the food storage, two boxes beside the door fall to the floor. When Jack wakes up those boxes are back on the pile again.

ozwal13

Other mistake: When Jack Nicholson is talking to the manager of the Overlook Hotel, the manager mentions the death of two girls aged 8 and 10. When Danny sees visions of the two girls they are unmistakably twins, not different ages. A quick look at the IMDb (http://uk.imdb.com/title/tt0081505/fullcredits) proves they are - Lisa and Louise Burns, both born in 1968.

Continuity mistake: If you compare the map of the maze posted outside on the actual maze (visible when Wendy and Danny first run inside it), to the model of the maze Jack looks at in the hotel which pans down to Wendy and Danny walking through it, the two maps look nothing alike.

Continuity mistake: When Jack is chopping at the bathroom door with the axe, he completely breaks through the right side panel. After the shot of Halloran arriving in the snow cat, we see Jack at the door again and there are a couple of large wood slivers lodged in the right panel.

Floyd1977

More quotes from The Shining

Trivia: Stephen King has admitted not liking this version of his book.

troy fox

More trivia for The Shining

Question: Whenever Jack is talking to Delbert Grady, Grady mentions his wife and two daughters; one of whom tried to burn the overlook down. My question is, are they the same twin girls Danny has visions of? Whenever Danny sees them dead in the hallway, the vision matches the story Ullman told Jack about Charles Grady. Why does Delbert Grady deny killing his wife and daughters when he was the caretaker, but then contradicts himself and go on to say he "corrected" them? Was he only denying being the caretaker since Jack has always been the caretaker? What is the connection between Delbert's story and what happened with Charles Grady?

Answer: Delbert Grady has always been at the hotel, just as Jack Torrance has...however, "Charles Grady" was one incarnation of the hotel's "caretaker", which Jack Torrance currently is. Delbert, evidenced by his appearance, occupation, and archaic racial views, has been with the hotel since its turn-of-the-century inception, just as Jack, in the photo at the end, has been. We don't know what "spirit-Jack's" function in the Overlook is...we only know that the present Jack (whom Delbert is talking to) embodies the "caretaker" who has always been there, just as Charles Grady did in his time. Delbert refers to his wife and two daughters, whom he did not murder...his "caretaker" version, Charles Grady, did that.

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