14 Isolation Films You Shouldn't Watch Alone

By Chris OMalley /

2. The Shining (1979)

Being isolated with a psychotic is probably the least appealing (apart from maybe The Road and Buried) of all the grim solitary scenarios presented here. Even more troubling is if said psychotic was actually your husband or your father, the person you are supposed to trust more than any other. As most are no doubt familiar with, this is exactly the ordeal which Wendy Torrance (Shelley Duvall) and her son Danny (Danny Lloyd) find themselves in when Jack Nicholson's Jack Torrance, an author with severe writer's block, falls foul to the dark energy of The Overlook Hotel in Kubrick's masterpiece of horror cinema. In a similar way to how Jaws had an irreversible effect on how we perceive the Great White, The Shining has forever changed how we view isolated country hotels - even more so if they haven't changed their carpets since the 70s.