8 Horror Movie Moments Nobody Understands

7. What Does The Picture Mean? - The Shining

The Shining
Warner Bros.

A classic of the genre, The Shining's ending will be debated for all time.

You know the story by now: in a snowed-in old hotel in the mountains, family man Jack Torrence torments his wife and son with an axe, driven mad by the spirits housed within the building's walls. Eventually outsmarted by the quick thinking of a five-year-old boy, Jack freezes to death after becoming lost in the hotel's garden maze.

That's not the end though, as we then cut back into the building and zoom in on a particularly eerie framed photograph hanging on the wall. As we get a closeup of a dinner party, we see that Jack is actually there in the image, front and centre. The only issue is? This picture was taken in 1929 and the movie takes place 50 years later, and Jack hasn't aged a day.

So what's the deal here? Was Jack reincarnated? Was he a ghost the whole time? Was he assimilated by the hotel after dying?

It's an ambiguous note that's been hotly debated for years, with no official answer coming either way.

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Josh has over 11 years of experience as a published writer, having worked nine of those years as a full-time content producer at WhatCulture. In that period he has created hundreds of articles, videos and podcast episodes for multiple WhatCulture channels, specialising in gaming, horror and film & TV. He now primarily works as a senior content producer and presenter on WhatCulture Gaming where he co-hosts the WhatCulture Gaming Podcast, a top 3 UK most listened to gaming podcast that he co-created in 2018. Over the years he has reviewed several high-profile gaming releases, covered industry events with on-site reporting, opined on breaking news, and even kicked off his interviewing career by chatting to childhood hero, Tommy Wiseau.