The Overlook’s Fate

Stanley Kubrick was pretty famous for literally destroying pieces of his movies that he didn’t use, but The Shining is especially wild because it had a different ending that made it to theaters that Kubrick pulled and cut out after the film had been out for a weekend.

That ending is just an extension of the final film, following on from Jack’s death in the snow. Thanks to some screenplay pages, the gist is this:

Wendy ends up in the hospital, where she’s visited by Stuart Ullman and tells her that the police have checked the hotel and found nothing that proves her story. She and Danny are invited to stay with him for a while as a screen of text tells the audience that “The Overlook Hotel would survive this tragedy, as it had many others. It is still open each year from May 20th to September 20th. It is closed for the winter.”