Stanley Kubrick's Original Hopeful Ending to THE SHINING Revealed

Stanley Kubrick's The Shining is one of my favorite horror films of all time, and most hardcore fans of the movie know that Kubrick had another ending for the film that he cut out at the last minute after the movie had opened up in limited theaters. There was two minutes of footage showing that Danny and Wendy were going to be alright were cut from the film.

The filmmaker sent assistants out to theaters and ordered the projectionists to send all the reels back to Warner Bros. studio to make sure none of the cuts of the original version would remain in existence, they were all destroyed. As far as we know the footage is lost, but you never know, one may have survived. There is a photo and now thanks to Pixar director and Shining fan Lee Unkrich, we have that part of the script for you to read! 

The scene picks up after the crazy events at the Overlook Hotel. Between the shot of Jack frozen in the snow and the long lobby shot that ends on the July 4th, 1921 framed photo. Mr. Ullman is in a hospital with Wendy and he tells her that Jack Torrance's body was never found. Diane Johnson helped write the screenplay for the film with Kubrick, and she said that he planned to use this more hopeful ending to the movie. She explains via The Overlook Hotel:

Kubrick had filmed a final scene that was cut, where Wendy and Danny are recovering from the shock in a hospital and where Ullman visits them. Kubrick felt that we should see them in the hospital so we would know that they were all right. He had a soft spot for Wendy and Danny and thought that, at the end of a horror film, the audience should be reassured that everything was back to normal.

I loved the ending we ended up getting, but I don't think the addition of this deleted scene would have hurt the film, or the story. Read the four pages of how that scene plays out below, and tell us what you think!