Jack Torrance looks across the desk at Stuart Ullman and thinks he looks like an “officious little prick.” Although, to be fair, Jack would likely hate anyone given the circumstances of the job interview. Ullman knows all about Jack’s history—about his alcoholism and how he “lost his temper” at his job back in Vermont and got fired—and if it weren’t for Al Shockley, Jack’s friend and an important man on the Overlook Hotel’s Board of Directors, Ullman would never hire Jack as the hotel’s winter caretaker. Jack assures Ullman that he won’t be sorry. Jack hasn’t had a drink in over a year, and his family—his wife, Wendy, and their five-year-old son, Danny—are looking forward to spending the winter together at the hotel. Plus, Jack will have time to work on the play he is writing. Ullman doesn’t look convinced and tells Jack about the previous winter caretaker, a man named Grady. Grady was a drunk, and while he was alone at the hotel with his wife and two young daughters, he went crazy and killed his family and himself. “Seclusion can be damaging,” Ullman says to Jack and shows him to the basement to meet Watson, the maintenance man.
As Watson familiarizes Jack with the furnace and the boiler, Jack thinks about what Ullman said about losing his temper. When Jack lost his temper with Danny a few years back—Danny went into Jack’s study and spilled beer all over the pages of Jack’s play—he grabbed Danny by the arm, intending to spank him, but Jack was drunk and broke Danny’s arm instead. Jack snaps out of his thoughts to the sound of Watson’s voice. He tells Jack that he must check the boiler twice a day. The thermostat “creeps,” Watson says, and there isn’t an automatic shutoff. The damper must be periodically hit, or the gauge will keep rising. If Jack doesn’t check the boiler, Watson says, Jack’s family will “wake up on the fuckin moon.” Back at the Torrances’ apartment in Boulder, Colorado, Danny sits on the curb waiting for Jack to return. Wendy comes outside and reminds Danny that his father won’t be home for hours, but Danny refuses to go inside. Wendy sits down next to him, and Danny asks why Jack lost his job back in Stovington. Wendy explains that Jack had been the coach of the debate team, and after he had to cut a student, George Hatfield, from the team, Jack found George slashing the tires on their car—a rundown Volkswagen. Jack hit George to get him to stop cutting the tires, Wendy tells Danny, and the school said they didn’t want Jack to teach there anymore. Danny asks if Jack hurt George like Jack had hurt him, and Wendy says it was “something like that.” Wendy leaves Danny outside, and he sits thinking about his parents. He understands plenty about them, and he knows that his mother is inside crying.
Danny has tried to explain to his parents that he can see their thoughts, and he has tried to tell them about Tony—his “imaginary friend” for all intents and purposes—but they don’t believe him. Sitting on the curb, Danny concentrates on Jack’s thoughts and begins to hear Jack’s voice inside his head. Suddenly, Danny hears Tony calling his name and can see him in the distance from the corner of his eye. Danny lets his mind go to the sound of Tony’s voice, and he is inside a room with snow piled high outside the windows. There is a mirror with the word “Redrum” written on it, and Danny can hear crashing sounds and a familiar voice yelling: “Come out! Come out, you little shit! Take your medicine!” The room fades and Danny is in a hallway with bright blue and black carpet. A dark figure is chasing him with a roque mallet, and Danny begs Tony to let him go. Danny opens his eyes on the curb and sees Jack approaching in the Volkswagen. As Jack pulls up to the curb, Danny sees a mallet sitting on the front seat. He blinks, and the mallet is a bag of groceries.
The Torrances arrive at the hotel and meet Dick Hallorann, the Overlook’s cook. Hallorann is a kind man, about 60 years old, and he familiarizes Wendy with the kitchen and supply of food and dry goods. Afterward, Hallorann asks Danny to help him carry his suitcases to his car, and when they are alone, he tells Danny that he knows he has a “knack.” Hallorann calls it “shining,” and Danny shines stronger than anyone Hallorann has ever met. Hallorann warns Danny that he will see things in the hotel, scary things, and tells him to stay out of room 217. If Danny ever needs him, Hallorann says, Danny should just call out to Hallorann in his mind. Danny’s shine is so strong, Hallorann will probably hear it in Florida where he goes to work in the offseason. Danny goes back inside, and Mr. Ullman takes the Torrances on a tour of the hotel. They pass room 217 without stopping, but on the third floor, they go inside the Presidential Suite and Danny can see blood all over the walls. This must be what Hallorann was talking about, Danny thinks to himself. Mr. Ullman leads them back downstairs where his own luggage is waiting. The rest of the staff has cleared out and the guests are all gone. As Ullman drives away, the Torrances are completely alone.
The Torrances easily settle into life at the Overlook. Jack is content with the mindless and steady work of maintaining the hotel, and Wendy is happy that Jack isn’t drinking. They are the happiest they have been in a long time, but Danny keeps having visions of “Redrum” written on the mirrors. One day, Jack finds a scrapbook in the basement while checking the boiler. The scrapbook is filled with newspaper clippings and contains the hotel’s entire history. As Jack sits to read it, Danny stands outside of room 217. He has the skeleton key in his hand, but he doesn’t open the door. Instead, Danny turns and walks away, down the bright blue and black carpet lining the hallway. A few days later, Jack trims the animal topiaries in front of the hotel while Wendy and Danny go into the nearest town for some early Christmas shopping—once the snow begins to fall, the roads will be closed, and they won’t be able to get down the mountain. As Jack trims the hotel’s massive lion-shaped hedges, he is certain that he sees them move, and he thinks he is going crazy. Weeks later, Danny works up the courage to enter room 217. He opens the door and goes into the bathroom, and in the bathtub is the ghost of Mrs. Massey, the woman who committed suicide in the room. She chases Danny and grabs at his neck, and he runs out the door and down to the lobby. When Danny finds Wendy and Jack, he is in hysterics, and his neck is badly bruised. Wendy looks at Jack suspiciously—she is sure he has abused Danny again.
Danny tells them all about the ghost in room 217, and Wendy insists on getting Danny down the mountain to a doctor, but the snow has already closed the roads. There is a snowmobile in the shed, she reminds Jack, and he goes out to check, growing more irritated with Wendy. He thinks about beating and killing her, and when he gets to the shed, he dismantles the snowmobile’s engine. Meanwhile, Danny goes to play in the snow near the animal topiaries. He digs in the snow and is suddenly aware of the ghost of a young boy. Danny runs, and as he does, the animal topiaries begin to chase him. Danny runs into the front door just in time and falls down crying. He tells his parents what has happened, but Jack accuses him of making up stories. Danny is confused. He knows Jack had his own experience with the topiaries, and when Danny says as much, Jack slaps him across the face. Wendy is furious, and Jack is instantly remorseful once again.
Days later, Danny stands in front of the clock on the mantel in the hotel’s ballroom. Although he doesn’t know why, Danny winds the clock and is struck with a vision of “Redrum.” Danny feels a sense of urgency and sends a message to Hallorann in Florida with his mind. Jack has been spending more and more time in the basement, and Danny can sense his father changing and going insane. In the meantime, Jack goes into the hotel’s bar and hallucinates that the place is packed. Lloyd, the bartender, lines up gin martinis, and Jack quickly drinks them. Grady is there, too, and he tells Jack he should punish Wendy and Danny and kill them with the mallet. Jack, drunk from so many martinis, falls and hits head. When he wakes up, Wendy is dragging him into the locked pantry in the kitchen. She knows Jack has become dangerous, and she needs time to figure out what to do. She can’t very easily get help; the phones have been knocked out in a snow storm and Jack said the snowmobile won’t start. During the night, Wendy and Danny listen to Jack’s screams, until they hear whispers and Jack quiets. In the kitchen, Grady appears outside the pantry door and lets Jack out. Now, Grady says, Jack must punish Wendy and Danny.
Sensing Jack is out of the pantry, Wendy goes to investigate. In the kitchen, the door to the pantry is wide open, and Jack is nowhere to be found. As she sneaks around the hotel with a knife in her hand, she can hear the clock chiming in the ballroom. Jack steps out of the shadows holding the roque mallet and chases Wendy, catching her on the stairs. He beats her with the mallet over and over again, cracking her ribs. Wendy remembers the knife and stabs him. He rolls down the stairs, and Wendy runs back to the room where she left Danny, but he is gone. She can hear Jack coming up the hall, and she locks herself in the bathroom. Jack begins to beat the door down with the mallet, and Wendy hears the sounds of a snowmobile outside. Jacks stops. He senses it is Hallorann, although he doesn’t know how. When Hallorann enters the lobby, Jack is waiting and hits him over the head with the mallet. Jack leaves Hallorann bleeding and goes to look for Danny.
As Danny runs through the hotel, he can hear Jack yelling at him to “take his medicine” and slamming the mallet into the walls. Danny runs to the third floor, where Jack corners him. Jack raises the mallet to strike Danny but stops. Danny sees something soften in Jack’s eyes, and he drops the mallet and tells Danny to run. As Danny runs away, listening to Jack’s continued screams, Wendy finds Hallorann on the lobby floor, and Danny runs into the room. He tells them frantically that Jack has not checked the boiler and they need to get out immediately. Hallorann looks to the clock on the mantel. It is one minute before midnight. At the same time, Jack is in the basement, pulling the lever on the boiler. Just as Jack begins to celebrate, thinking he has hit the damper in time, the boiler explodes, and he is engulfed in flames. Hallorann drags Wendy and Danny from the flaming hotel. Wendy is hurt, but Halloran manages to get both Wendy and Danny on the snowmobile and safely down the mountain. Months later, Wendy and Danny are relaxing at a hotel resort in Maine where Hallorann has taken a job. They are healing—both mentally and physically—after the ordeal at the hotel, and Jack’s life insurance has made the future a little less scary. As Danny fishes from the dock, Wendy and Hallorann sit contentedly and watch him in the fading afternoon sun.
