1. Room 237 (2012)
Metrodome Distribution
What's It All About? That really is the question. Rodney Aschers highly acclaimed documentary Room 237 concerns itself with nine wildly different and somewhat fanciful interpretations as to the hidden meanings buried within Stanley Kubricks classic adaptation of Stephen Kings The Shining (which King himself famously disliked.) Whether you agree with the theory that The Shining is really a discourse on the Jewish Holocaust, or the genocide of the American Indians, or Kubricks covert admission that he was involved in the faking of the Apollo moon landings, what makes this documentary so compelling is that it isnt about the veracity, or otherwise, of any of these ideas at all. Rather it is concerned with the very notion of our tendency to find meaning in art which was never intended by the artist themselves.
What's The Question Then? If there is meaning in a forest, but there is no-one around to believe it, is it still a valid meaning? Or put another way, if a viewer sees meaning in a film, which the filmmakers never intended to portray, is it any less valid than the real meaning, which they did mean? Um... what was that again?
Does It Answer It? You gotta find your own meanings, man https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sZe_MyQqiws
Which other mind-bending films made you question everything? Let us know in the comments!