MovieChat Forums > The Shining (1980) Discussion > Was the "redrum door" an inverted cross?

Was the "redrum door" an inverted cross?

posted 4 years ago by christomacin (4730)
29 replies | jump to latest

Here is the most famous shot of the "redrum door", although it only appears in the film for a few scant seconds:
https://external-preview.redd.it/ul4F2B1qnFPqfulNtv4cYwpzK4tu9eXmEwcGYtSGJKI.jpg?auto=webp&s=eabde5775f167099303d052b98b59a46d5fc9d7f

Notice how the paneling on the door forms an inverted cross. Is it a coincidence that "redrum" (a symbol for blood and wine?) just so happens to spell "murder" if inverted horizontally, and just so happens to be written on a door which when flipped vertically is a Christian Cross? Think also of the links between Christ's death on the cross, the symbolic importance of his blood and it's ritual association with wine.

The music used when Jack does his first killing is intercut with the "redrum door", the "blood elevators" and the music of Penderecki. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OChx37ef5zU&t=63s Is it really a coincidence that the rattling music used in that scene is an EASTER work, part two of Penderecki's Utrenja (depicting the Resurrection). This part is called entitled Part II: Zmartwychwstanie Pańskie (The Resurrection of Christ) I. Ewangelia (The Gospel). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utrenja. Notice how Jack "rises" into frame after killing Halloran and Penderecki rattling music from this piece is heard. The music is visually associated with both the door and the elevator.

One other thing, one shot in particular of the door is shot at a very striking and unusual angle. If you flip the door vertically, the angle of the door will remind you of a famous depiction of the Crucifixion by Salvador Dali, "Christ of St. John of the Cross":
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christ_of_Saint_John_of_the_Cross

This "St. John" crucifix appears in several other religious works by Dali, most notable his "The Discovery of America by Christopher Columbus". Notice the angle of the crucifix the priest is holding in the bottom center of the painting, and a second and larger one in the upper right third of the painting:
https://i.pinimg.com/originals/12/7c/02/127c02b861f6ace7546063262ce66d85.jpg

[–] enriquesingh (1812) 4 years ago

Interesting.

[–] christomacin (4730) 4 years ago

A lot of have people become very perturbed by this observation in the past when I've brought it up. Either because they find it sacrilegious and disturbing, or on the other extreme, because they didn't like the idea of an agnostic like Kubrick using religious symbolism. I don't really understand this reaction. Why couldn't Kubrick use Christian symbolism just like he referenced Greco-Roman mythology in numerous of his films? For instance, Kubrick's self-financed 1955 film "The Killer's Kiss" was produced by his own "Minotaur Productions". Many years later he incorporated the maze into The Shining story (not in King's novel), which he and screenwriter Diane Johnson explicitly stated was inspired by the Minotaur legend. "2001: A Space Odyssey" not only referenced Homer's Ulysses in its title, but the character Bowman echoes Ulysses, who was an archer.

I should also point out the Kubrick used Ligeti's Requiem (with religious overtones) in 2001. The Shining itself begins with the Latin plainchant "Dies Irae" (Day of Wrath). Another Penderecki work used in The Shining was "The Awakening (or Dream) of Jacob", which is derived from the Old Testament.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3IfNwzJ6Odo&ab_channel=PaulS.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacob%27s_Ladder
This piece is used during The scene where Jack awakens from his nightmare about murdering Danny and Wendy. The beginning section of the work is also used when Danny has his premonition of the blood elevator while in the bathroom in Boulder, Colorado.

P.S. I'm not suggesting Kubrick was religious, because I don't think he was. There are a lot of political and philosophical interpretations you could make that explain why he used these particular pieces of music.

[–] enriquesingh (1812) 4 years ago

I just find it interesting that there's hidden symbolism related to religion, culture, etc... in Kubrick's work that is still being studied, analyzed, discovered by viewers today.

[–] sslssg (35178) 4 years ago

I don't really think that that shot would have been coincidence. I think Kubric was too meticulous.

[–] ducksoup (3933) 4 years ago

> "redrum" (a euphemism for blood and wine)

Is there a source for this? I never heard this euphemism and couldn't find it online.

[–] Forky (1739) 4 years ago

cause it's made up

[–] christomacin (4730) 4 years ago

You're correct. I SHOULDN'T have used the word "euphemism". That isn't quite correct. HOWEVER, "redrum" and the blood river are clearly linked in Danny's hallucination scenes (in the movie, at least)... that's not made up. Red rum is also a drink which looks a lot like blood. Jesus and the Disciples didn't drink rum but rather wine, that's true enough, but I don't think it's a very convincing dismissal over the overall themes of blood, sacrifice, and such.

[–] ducksoup (3933) 4 years ago

Is there a red rum drink that predates The Shining?

[–] christomacin (4730) 4 years ago

Yes, Stephen King's use of redrum in his book predates the movie. For King it was just a clever way of concealing the word murder. It's the possible symbolism of blood and the use of a red alcoholic beverage in Catholic ritual and how it is being paired with the door and the blood elevators in Kubrick's film I'm talking about. The blood elevator and the design of the door were down to Kubrick, not King. I think it's not any stretch at all that both King and Kubrick recognized the connections between murder and redrum, but Kubrick (I argue) took it quite a bit further than that. It's because all the other visual and musical things Kubrick's doing that I think can make a case for it. I seriously doubt King ever made these connections.... but Kubrick may have. Obviously, Kubrick kept the word "redrum" in the film because it happens to be "murder" backwards. Now "redwine" backwards spells "eniwder", but that doesn't make much sense, does it? The fact that Kubrick left the word as is proves nothing, though. The most important thing here is the word "murder" (inverted) on an what looks an awful lot like an inverted cross. If he was criticizing the role of religious organizations in aiding and abetting the imperial activities of European nation states, who in turn used the Catholic church (and other Christian denominations) to give them a veneer of moral cover for their activities, that would be one way to do that. If the idea that The Shining has imperialism and "the White Man's Burden" as a subtext has any merit at all, then why would the role of Christianity as an institution in the West's rise to dominance be exempt? I happen to think Kubrick believed ALL human civilizations and religions throughout history do the same thing, and that the film is also a critique of humanity as a whole, but that's a longer discussion. One thing at a time.

P.S. As I said, this theory has gotten a very hostile reaction every time I've bring it up.

[–] ducksoup (3933) 4 years ago

I think you have some interesting ideas. But it does seem to me like you are going a bit out on a tangent in your interpretation. I have a hard time believing either King or Kubrick were referring to sacramental wine with "red rum". And though googling "red rum" does reveal some drinks, they appear to be inspired by the Shining rather than the other way around.

Anyway, good luck with your research.

[–] christomacin (4730) 4 years ago

I was saying "red rum" is metaphor for blood, not that it was an actual drink... this seems obvious regardless of whether the door is an "inverted cross" or not. If it's a metaphor for blood than I'm not sure how my tangent is any more tenuous than most other tangents I've read about this movie. As a matter of fact, it's pretty straightforward. I could be totally wrong, but it's not that hard to see how a film-maker could arrive at the connection and how neatly it ties into one of the (almost certain) key themes of the film. There are lots of other themes going on in the movie of course... the use of mirrors and doubles, the Jungian shadow self, Todorov's concept of the uncanny, repressed memory and trauma, physical and sexual abuse in the family structure, etc. I don't think one shot of a door "explains everything", but the image is a striking and highly suggestive one, and I'm not yet convinced it's just a coincidence. I do agree that the Salvador Dali angle is a bit tenuous.

[–] FilmBuff (7436) 4 years ago

As I recall, red rum was, as you said, a clever way to disguise the word murder. What made it a clever disguise was Danny's father's alcoholism, so the reader fixated more on the rum aspect, along with the color red being the color of blood. Was there going to be a cup of blood later in the book? Would his father get drunk and hurt him again? Who knows?

As for Kubrick, you are perhaps going off on a tangent without any real evidence. That you see a similarity between the angle at which the door was shot and the angle at which a cross is being held in a Dali painting seems like the cinematic version of pareidolia, and other than portions of the soundtrack coming from classical pieces with religious overtones-- which many classical pieces have-- is a massive stretch.

It's an interesting theory, to be sure, but one I find hard to accept without at least a little evidence.

[–] christomacin (4730) 4 years ago

"a cross is being held in a Dali painting seems like the cinematic version of pareidolia"

I would NOT be willing to wager any money on that either. I've said repeatedly that connection is tenuous, and also that the angle isn't quite right once flipped. I don't really care about that so much, it's not central to my argument and can be, um... sacrificed.. he he.

"and other than portions of the soundtrack coming from classical pieces with religious overtones-- which many classical pieces have-- is a massive stretch."

Bartok's "Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta" doesn't have any religious overtones. I do have an idea why Kubrick used the Bartok piece in the movie, though. In the book, Wendy listens to the Bartok opera "Bluebeard's Castle" while reading a book. So the use of Bartok could be a call back to King's novel, but with a more effective pieces employed by Kubrick. The piece "Lontano" by Ligeti isn't religious. The word "lontano" is Italian for "far away" or "distant". Significant? Who knows? Several pieces by Penderecki used in the film I haven't mentioned aren't religious either. These are pretty abstract pieces with titles like "Polymorphia" and "De Natura Sonoris", so hard to read much into those. So, you could make an argument the two Penderecki pieces that do have religious overtones are just a coincidence. That's fair. I'm not a fanatic and I'm open to criticism.

There's some footage on the set of the movie with Kubrick talking to Danny Lloyd with a Wendy Carlos arrangement of the "Valse Triste" by Sibelius playing in the background. That music isn't religious either, although the play "Kuolema (Death)" that Valse Triste was written for does have spooky overtones. The scene in the play the music was written for has a young woman dancing with Death. Another question is how late in post production did Kubrick choose this music? Kubrick didn't incorporate Classical music into 2001: A Space Odyssey until the last minute, so one has to be careful reading too much into the "meanings" of the music used in his films. By the time of "The Shining", Kubrick had a reputation for using Classical music in his films. Does that mean he took greater care choosing the music for this movie? Did Kubrick himself choose the music himself, or was it done by a "music analyst" employed by him? Unknown. Still, the fact that Valse Triste was being played during production is at least some evidence that Kubrick was trying out specific pieces of music ON SET - although not the ones being discussed here (as far as we know), obviously.

[–] jonathan_k80 (6436) 4 years ago

Maybe "red" for the color of blood, and "rum" for an alcoholic beverage like wine...?

[–] christomacin (4730) 4 years ago

"Maybe "red" for the color of blood, and "rum" for an alcoholic beverage like wine...?"

Of course... they are taking it too literally and missing the point I was trying to make.

I will also say that I have tried matching the angle of the door in the movie and the angle of the cross in the Dali painting. Using a movie maker program, I did a vertical invert of a screen cap of the door and dissolved it over an image of the painting to see if they matched. The angles aren't exactly the same, but they were pretty close. The Dali part of my argument is the least persuasive part of my argument, so I'm not going to push that too hard.

[–] jonathan_k80 (6436) 4 years ago

It could also represent a cross-shaped grave marker, like this one:
https://hcwood.com/images/crosses/HC_barnett.jpg

Flip the door image upside-down and you are peering down into a grave.

[–] TheDemon (598) 4 years ago

Maybe half the doors on the planet have those panels.
I have them at my joint.
Means nothing.

[–] christomacin (4730) 4 years ago

That's true, cross-shaped paneling is very common. I've seen it a lot myself. But most doors of that type don't often have redrum written on them, nor are they featured in a film full of mirror inversions of various types. It's the context in the film and the visual and musical pairings that seem to be associated with it that is being debated here. Symbolism can used even with commonly found objects can't it? A yellow Volkswagon Beetle or a Calumet baking soda can are also fairly common and wouldn't normally mean much either - but in the film they might due to the context.

Also, Kubrick was notorious for obsessing over things like doors and windows in his films. His estate is full of boxes of photos of these things from the preproduction research for various films he made over the years, and even a few he never got around to. The idea that he chose this particular design for the door isn't hard to believe at all... he really was that meticulous and obsessive. Even I have a hard time believing it sometimes, but too many things have checked out over the years to dismiss it so easily. Check out "Kubrick's Boxes": https://youtu.be/eiIcofonlmU

[–] Fandango (535) 4 years ago

It is difficult to deny the negative stance Kubrick has of America's foundation. Upon critical examination, what the audience comes away with is that a nation, ostensibly built under the pretense of religious adherence and spiritual underpinnings, is mired in coercion and blood. The blood coming from the elevator is highly suggestive of the notion that The Overlook hotel, a symbol of Americanism, was built through force.

With this in mind, the potential religious symbolism on the door with murder may imply that Christianity, while presented as medicine for the soul, is far from morally righteous. While the hotel's superficial exterior is pristine and beautiful, its interior does not align with what is shown outside before the audience enters the hotel. This indicates that while American Protestantism purports to align itself with frugality, spirituality, and oneness with God, the hotel gives off the visceral aura that this couldn't be further from the truth.

The Overlook Hotel, a symbol of America, is highly materialistic. The inconsistency between the interior and exterior contrasts with Matthew 6:24: "You cannot worship God and mammon." While there is an undeniable beauty to the hotel, inside we see a spiritual vacuity in the form of murder, pedophilia, debauchery, and overall impropriety.

Still, despite all of this, I believe it is the maze itself which gives us the real clue regarding the film. The maze is the ultimate metaphor for the film itself. It highlights that there is no single key or answer to the film's questions. It is complex, confusing, and multi-varied.

Jack, in following Danny's footsteps, gets lost. What this symbolizes, in a rather beautiful meta narrative, is that the indexical quality of the footprints; that is, what the audience sees, is not to be taken at face value. The footprints—much like the symbols and images in the film—have led Jack astray, just like the audience.

[–] christomacin (4730) 4 years ago

I believe the maze and the minotaur legend were in Kubrick's mind long before he even found King's novel. As a matter of fact, I wouldn't be surprised if he was looking for a story to frame the maze around, and King's novel was the chosen vehicle. The production company Kubrick formed for his second film "The Killer's Kiss" way back in 1955 was named... "Minotaur Productions". That gives us some insight into Kubrick's own priorities. The central importance of the maze is not given enough attention, I agree. However, the grandfather of the modern analysis of The Shining seems to be Bill Blakemore's 1987 Washington Post article "Kubrick's Shining Secret":
https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/style/1987/07/12/kubricks-shining-secret/a7e3433d-e92e-4171-b46f-77817f1743f0/

[–] whynotwriteme (7815) 4 years ago

Very interesting! I hadn't thought of the religious implications of using Penderecki's Utrenja. All I know is that it's the most unsettling, terrifying music I have ever heard in my life. Every time I hear it to this day, the hairs on my neck rise and my stomach fills with butterflies. It makes the darkest Death Metal seem like KidzBop by comparison.

[–] christomacin (4730) 4 years ago

A lot of analysis in the past noted that the music "sounds like Native American chanting". It might be possible that Kubrick intended that, but it's a subjective interpretation of why it was used. However, the actual content and intent of the music offers a far more compelling avenue of interpretation. As I mentioned, one of the other Penderecki pieces used in the move (The Awakening of Jacob) also deals with Biblical subject matter strongly tied (in a very dark inversion) to events in the film. As I mentioned earlier, this piece of music is also used during Danny's first nightmare vision of the blood river.

I said I wasn't going to push the Salvador Dali angle too hard... but I lied (LOL). After doing some research on the Bible account of the Dream of Jacob (in which Jacob's Ladder appeared), I do think there might be a tie in to the "St. John of the Cross" painting of Dali. In that painting, the cross is depicted at a very weird and surreal angle, which makes it impossible for the viewer to know if we are seeing it from above (God's perspective in the sky) or from below (Man's perspective from the ground). So, Dali is using surrealist techniques to illustrate the transcendent nature of Jesus, being both God and Man, and a "Ghost" all at the same time. Jacob's Ladder from Jacob's Dream has been interpreted by Christianity thusly (from Wikipedia): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacob%27s_Ladder

Jesus said in John 1:51 "And he saith unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Hereafter ye shall see heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of man." This statement has been interpreted as associating or implicating Jesus with the mythical ladder, in that Christ bridges the gap between Heaven and Earth. Jesus presents himself as the reality to which the ladder points; as Jacob saw in a dream the reunion of Heaven and Earth, Jesus brought this reunion, metaphorically the ladder, into reality. Adam Clarke, an early 19th-century Methodist theologian and Bible scholar, elaborates:

That by the angels of God ascending and descending, is to be understood, that a perpetual intercourse should now be opened between heaven and earth, through the medium of Christ, who was God manifested in the flesh. Our blessed Lord is represented in his mediatorial capacity as the ambassador of God to men; and the angels ascending and descending upon the Son of Man, is a metaphor taken from the custom of dispatching couriers or messengers from the prince to his ambassador in a foreign court, and from the ambassador back to the prince.

[–] whynotwriteme (7815) 4 years ago

A lot of analysis in the past noted that the music "sounds like Native American chanting". It might be possible that Kubrick intended that, but it's a subjective interpretation of why it was used.

It sounds nothing at all like Native American chanting to me. Anyone putting forth that theory probably has not heard much NA music! Even when I first saw this at age 15, it sounded very European and Medieval to me. It reminded me then and now of something that would be used at a Satanic ritual and I was very surprised to learn that it had its basis in Christian motifs.

[–] christomacin (4730) 4 years ago

I agree about it not sounding like Native American music. It sounded alien to people and they heard percussion and immediately tied it into Blakemore's Native American thesis... but I feel they were wrong. I think Penderecki may have intended that section to have an element of awe and mystery about it. I guess if a bunch of angels in the sky started singing praises it might be somewhat frightening to behold (if you believe in such things). I've tried to find a translation of the entire work, but so far have failed. I'm not sure exactly what is being said in the lyrics, so we can only guess. Penderecki was definitely a Catholic, though. As matter of fact, back in 1974 when this was premiered people complained that Penderecki's music had gotten too "accessible" and "pretty". How weird was music back then? Pretty weird, apparently, if Penderecki was considered a conservative. It does sound rather Satanic though, which is probably why Kubrick chose it. Speaking of Satanic (or at least pagan), weren't November 1st and May 1st the starting and ending dates of Jack's Overlook contract? I'm not sure about the opening date, but May 1st is specifically mentioned. This would further deepen the connection between blood, sacrifice, and Christianity, but again through a warped and inverted lens. Looking at it from a secular angle, this could be a comment on how the weak (minorities, women, children, the lower class) - as well as family life, sexual intimacy, and morality - have to be "sacrificed" for progress and success.

*By the way, Penderecki died in March of 2020, at age 86. His passing went largely unnoticed due to the pandemic.

[–] whynotwriteme (7815) 4 years ago

I find your The Shining research far more valid, believable and interesting than the "Room 237" doc. You should do a Youtube video or at least a blog about this.

If they thought Penderecki had gotten too pretty and accessible with Utrenja, I am almost terrified to listen to his earlier works! YIKES!

[–] christomacin (4730) 4 years ago

His "greatest hit" was a real toe-tapper called "Threnody for the Victims of Hiroshima""
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p9xAjiZo7go

[–] whynotwriteme (7815) 4 years ago

God! That was traumatizing. The only positive thing I can say about it is that it is the most appropriate soundtrack for a nuclear attack I have ever heard. I don't think I ever want to listen to that again.

[–] L1 (1316) 4 years ago

I think its a demonic posession that comes from sin and being a child of the lie.

[–] christomacin (4730) 4 years ago

What is? You mean Danny's trance-like state when he starts saying "redrum"? Please clarify.