Night 17 of the Attack of the 31 Nights of Halloween

 

Welcome to night 17 of the 3rd annual Attack of the 31 Nights of Halloween. Make sure to stop by our Giveaway Post and enter to win a $400+ Prize Pack full of frightfully good treats from 24 spooktacular shops! Tonight we have the next movie from the Halloween Movie Marathon. Follow along for an extra 10 entries in the giveaway and play the Guess The Movie game for even more. We also have the next clue in the Murder Mystery Scavenger Hunt. Gather clues for daily entries and a surprise at the end of the giveaway. But that's not all! Keep reading to find the next feature on one of our participating shops. Visit us each day during October so you do not miss any of the fun.

Blood Splatter Compact - Style A  $15

Purchase any item(s) from Laughing Vixen Lounge through October 31st and get 10% off your order. Use code OTOBER10 at checkout.

Scares That Care
In addition to having lots of fun we want to try and do a little good too Many of our shops have chosen a charity to fund raise for. A certain percentage or dollar amount of each sale made through the participating shops, during the giveaway, will be donated to the charity of their choice. You will find each shops details on the main Giveaway Post and on their shop feature.

Laughing Vixen Lounge will be donating $1 from each item sold during October to Support Supernatural to help A Dog's Life Rescue. The amazing gals at Support Supernatural (as in the TV show) have been fundraising for A Dog's Life Rescue since 2009 and have raised over $100,000 to help animals in need.

Murder Mystery Scavenger Hunt - Night 17
Our scavenger hunt will work like the game Clue this year. Every week you will be looking for clues to a different part of the mystery ~ Settings, Suspects, Rooms, Weapons and Escapes. They will be hidden within an item listing inside one of our participating shops. On each daily post you will be given a hint as to where the main clue is hiding. Once you find the clue go to the main Giveaway Post and find that night's entry on the Rafflecopter widget. You must leave the clue through the Rafflecopter! Do not post the clue anywhere on the blog. If you do it will be deleted and will not count. If you have any questions just ask.

Make sure to keep a list of all the clues as you collect them. On the last day of the giveaway you will be able to submit your guess of how the murder happened. Anyone who actually guesses correctly will win a Surprise Goodie Bag from Laughing Vixen Lounge. These goodie bags are made to suit your taste and usually end up being at least a $50 value! You can start the scavenger hunt game at anytime during the giveaway and go back to find past clues. Clues will stay posted through the entire giveaway.

Night 17
A body is found.
This week you will be collecting clues to the rooms of the crime.

Tonight's clue is hiding in The Tiny Bee.
Need a little help finding the clue? Spooky trio.


Featured Shop - The Tiny Bee

The Tiny Bee is run by Melissa from Tucson, Arizona. Her shop is filled with lots of fun handmade jewelry and accessories.

Orange Flower Push Pins  $10

How did you choose your shop name?
"I was sitting in my backyard brainstorming ideas for my shop name when a tiny baby bee landed on my arm. My name, Melissa, means honey bee so it was perfect."

Love Key Chain  $10

Why did you choose to make/sell what you do?
"I love working with fabric and clay because the creative possibilities are endless and I like to leave myself the freedom to grow."

Black and White Zipper Pouch  $15

What inspires the designs/creations you make?
"I do. Everything I make is something I would buy and use so I basically just make things I love and hope others love them too."

Yellow Rose Stud Earrings  $10

What new designs/creations would you like to add to your shop in the future?
"I love the look of embroidery and would like to incorporate some of that into my designs."

Black Rose Cocktail Ring  $10

The Tiny Bee will be donating 3% of all October sales to the Kiva Lending Team. Small businesses helping others start businesses with small loans.

You'll have a chance to win a set of bat magnets from The Tiny Bee. Enter now on the main giveaway post.

Bat Halloween Magnets  $10

Visit The Tiny Bee and use coupon code TTB15 at checkout for 15% off your order.

Since it's Halloween I asked the shops to share their favorite spooky movie. 
"I'm a wimp when it comes to scary movies but I remember being terrified as a kid that the bad guys were going to capture E.T."

Attack of the 31 Nights of Halloween Movie Marathon.
Follow along with us for a month full of classic and modern spooky movies. For something a little different this year we have decided to do themed weeks. Week 1 ~ Zombies, Week 2 ~ Werewolves and Vampires, Week 3 ~ Stephen King, Week 4 ~ Classic Double Features and Week 5 ~ Lounge Favorites.

On each daily post there will be a review of the next movie in our movie marathon. Leave a comment on each post with your opinion of that movie. On the last day of the giveaway you will find the Magic Phrase you will use to unlock the entry on the main Giveaway Post worth 10 entries. You must comment on each movie post to qualify.

Guess The Movie Game
This year we decided not to post the movie list in full so we can play a fun game instead. Each daily post will have a clue to the next night's movie. Leave your guess on the Rafflecopter widget, on the main Giveaway Post, for 1 entry in the giveaway. Please do not post guesses anywhere else on the blog or they will be deleted and not count.

 **Guesses must be posted the same day as their clue to receive the entry** Rafflecopter runs on Eastern Standard Time. You can only post 1 guess per 24 hour period. So if you miss a day you can not make it up. 

Tonight's Clue ~ Groceries, aliens and the end of the world.

Week 3 ~ Stephen King

Night 17 - The Shining

 

Tagline - A Masterpiece Of Modern Horror.
              The Horror is driving him crazy.


Stanley Kubrick (A Clockwork Orange and Full Metal Jacket) directed this film version of Stephen King's best selling novel. Released May 23, 1980 by Warner Brothers Pictures (Rated R). Recovering alcoholic, Jack Torrance (Jack Nicholson) has accepted a job as winter caretaker of the grand Overlook Hotel in an attempt to put his life back on track. The hotel manager warns him of the long and lonely winter ahead as he and his family will be alone and snowed in for the five month off-season. Jack assures him it's just what he needs to work on his writing. What Jack doesn't know is that he and his family are not the only ones inhabiting the Overlook! Muaahhhhhhh!

Being a fan of the book there are some aspects of this movie version that I don't care for. Jack seems to not like his family from the start and he almost changes into a crazy man overnight. A little more of a transition into madness would have been nice.

That being said I really do like this movie. It's creepy, creepy and then a bit more creepy! What really makes this movie creepy is the time period. I never could put my finger on it when I was a teenager as to why it left me with an unpleasant feeling. As I got older I began to realize it's the late 70's look of it. The colors and the patterns of the floors, walls and furniture. The color and the style of the clothing. And the fact that the film used makes the colors look a little off or maybe too vivid.

I liken it to when you were younger and you went to visit your grandparents. The ones that still lived in that old house with the furniture from many decades past. The one where you open the door and an instant musty smell filled your nose. That's how I think the Overlook would feel like now. While grand in it's day, now it's outdated and needs to be aired out. The dated wall paper would be pealing around the edges and the bathroom tiles would be old an worn looking. While it was high fashion when the movie was made now it just adds to the uneasiness of it.

I also love the mini series they made in 1997. It stared Steven Weber (Wings (TV) and Single White Female), a personal favorite of mine, and was very faithful to the novel. If you're a fan of the book this version should appeal to you. I thought it was great.


Take a look at the original trailer




Some trivia about the movie.

1. Timberline Lodge on Mt. Hood in Oregon stood in for the exterior shots of the Overlook. Being from Portland I take great pride in seeing Timberline up there on the screen. It should be noted though that all interior shots of the hotel were filmed on a sound stage in London. So if you should visit Timberline don't expect the inside to look the same and don't expect to find room 237. Afraid that no one would want to stay in the room after the film came out, the management asked that the original room number, 217, be changed to something else. 237 was picked as there was no existing room with that number.
2. The opening scene of the Volkswagen driving is shot in Glacier National Park, Montana. The road is know as the "Going-to-the-sun" road.
3. The area that the set for the Colorado Lounge, where Jack does his typing, was built was also used as the Well of the Souls in Raiders of the lost ark.
4. The interior of the Overlook was made to look like bits and pieces of real hotels. The Colorado Lounge was modeled on the lounge at the Ahwanee Hotel in Yosemite Valley. It resembled it so well that people entering the Ahwanee often asked "is this the Shining hotel?"
5. The US version had Jack typing the same line "All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy" over and over. In the Italian version it's "He who wakes up early meets a golden day". In the German version it's "Never put off till tomorrow what you can do today". The Spanish version has "Rising early will not make dawn sooner". The French went with "A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush".
6. Stephen King has said that the name was inspired by the John Lennon song "Instant Karma" which features the chorus "We all shine on".
7. Stanley Kubrick decided that having the hedge animals come alive (as they do in the book) was unworkable due to restrictions in special effects, so he opted for a hedge maze instead.   
8. There is a great deal of confusion regarding this film and the number of retakes of certain scenes. According to the Guinness Book of Records, the scene where Wendy is backing up the stairs swinging the baseball bat was shot 127 times, which is a record for the most takes of a single scene. However, both Steadicam operator Garrett Brown and assistant editor Gordon Stainforth say this is inaccurate - the scene was shot about 35-45 times. Brown does say however that the scene where Hallorann explains to Danny what shining is was shot 148 times, which is a world record.   
9. Stanley Kubrick considered both Robert De Niro and Robin Williams for the role of Jack Torrance but decided against both of them. Kubrick didn't think De Niro would suit the part after watching his performance in Taxi Driver, as he deemed De Niro not psychotic enough for the role. He didn't think Williams would suit the part after watching his performance in Mork & Mindy, as he deemed him too psychotic for the role. According to Stephen King, Kubrick also briefly considered Harrison Ford.   
10. Stephen King tried to talk Stanley Kubrick out of casting Jack Nicholson in the lead suggesting, instead, either Michael Moriarty or Jon Voight. King had felt that watching either of these normal-looking men gradually descend into madness, would have immensely improved the dramatic thrust of the storyline.   
11. The scrapbook that Jack finds in the novel makes a brief appearance next to his typewriter in the scene when Jack tells Wendy never to bother him while he's working.   
12. During the scene where Wendy brings Jack breakfast in bed, it can be seen in the reflection of the mirror that Jack's T-shirt says "Stovington" on it. While not mentioned in the film, this is the name of the school that Jack used to teach at in the Stephen King novel.   
13. Stanley Kubrick, known for his compulsiveness and numerous retakes, got the difficult shot of blood pouring from the elevators in only three takes. This would be remarkable if it weren't for the fact that the shot took nine days to set up; every time the doors opened and the blood poured out, Kubrick would say, "It doesn't look like blood." In the end, the shot took approximately a year to get right.   
14. During filming, Stanley Kubrick made the cast watch Eraserhead, Rosemary's Baby and The Exorcist to put them in the right frame of mind.   
15. Every time Jack talks to a "ghost", there's a mirror in the scene, except in the food locker scene. This is because in the food locker scene he only talks to Grady through the door. We never see Grady in this scene.   
16. At the time of release, it was the policy of the MPAA to not allow the portrayal of blood in trailers that would be approved for all audiences. Bizarrely, the trailer for The Shining consists entirely of the shot of blood pouring out of the elevator. Stanley Kubrick had convinced the board the blood flooding out of the elevator was actually rusty water.   
17. Because Danny Lloyd was so young and since it was his first acting job, Stanley Kubrick was highly protective of the child. During the shooting of the movie, Lloyd was under the impression that the film he was making was a drama, not a horror movie. He only realized the truth seven years later, when, aged 13, he was shown a heavily edited version of the film. He didn't see the uncut version of the film until he was 17 - eleven years after he'd made it.   
18. Outtakes of the shots of the Volkswagen traveling towards the Overlook at the start of the film were plundered by Ridley Scott (with Stanley Kubrick's permission) when he was forced to add the 'happy ending' to the original release of Blade Runner.   
19. The "snowy" maze near the conclusion of the movie consisted of 900 tons of salt and crushed Styrofoam.   
20. Stanley Kubrick's first choice to play Danny Torrance was Cary Guffey, the young boy from Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Guffey's parents apparently turned down the offer due to the film's subject matter.   
21. There were so many changes to the script during shooting that Jack Nicholson claimed he stopped reading it. He would read only the new pages that were given to him each day.   
22. For the scene in which Jack breaks down the bathroom door, the props department built a door that could be easily broken. However, Jack Nicholson had worked as a volunteer fire marshal and tore it apart far too easily. The props department were then forced to build a stronger door.
23. Prior to hiring Diane Johnson as his writing partner, director/producer Stanley Kubrick rejected a screenplay written by Stephen King himself. King's script was a much more literal adaptation of the novel, a much more traditional horror film than the film Kubrick would ultimately make. He was considering hiring Johnson because he admired her novel "The Shadow Knows," but when he found out she was a Doctor of Gothic Studies, he became convinced she was the person for the job.
24. There was no air conditioning on the sets, meaning it would often become very hot. The hedge maze set was stifling; actors and crew would often strip off as much of the heavy clothing they were wearing as quickly as they could once a shot was finished.   
25. The role of Lloyd the Bartender was originally to have been played by Harry Dean Stanton, who was unable to take the part due to his commitment to Alien.   
26. The image of the two girls in the hotel corridor was inspired by the photograph "Identical Twins, Roselle, New Jersey, 1967" by Diane Arbus.   
27. The idea for Danny Lloyd to move his finger when he was talking as Tony was his own; he did it spontaneously during his very first audition.   
28. For the scenes when we can hear Jack typing but we cannot see what he is typing, Kubrick recorded the sound of a typist actually typing the words "All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy". Some people argue that each key on a typewriter sounds slightly different, and Kubrick wanted to ensure authenticity, so he insisted that the actual words be typed.   
29. There is a character named Richard Haloran in the film Dementia 13, about an axe murderer. It was produced by Roger Corman, who directed several of Jack Nicholson's early films.   
30. Stephen King got the idea for The Shining while his family were staying at the Stanley Hotel. They were the last guests before it shut down for the Winter. He saw a group of nuns leaving the hotel, and it got him thinking that the place had suddenly become godless. The King family stayed in Room 217, the haunted room in the novel but Room 237 in the film; a fire hose also resembled a snake (which doesn't appear in the film but does in the TV mini-series), and King had already been playing around with a story idea about a boy with ESP, so he combined the two plot lines.
31. The first of Stephen King's books to be banned from school libraries because of the theme of wicked parents.