A New 4K Restoration of The Shining Is Coming

EDIT: The original title of this news post was “A New 4K Restoration of The Shining Is Coming, With Mysterious New Footage,” due to an error in Warner Bros. initial press release. This error stated that the new 4K restoration was “Kubrick’s 146 minute cut” of The Shining, implying that this version would contain the famously deleted “hospital scene” that was at the end of the film. However, Warner Bros. has now corrected its press release, stating that this 4K restoration is instead the standard, 144-minute cut of The Shining that audiences are familiar with.

Well, this should certainly pique the interest of the horror historians in the house. A new 4K restoration of The Shining was announced this week by Warner Bros., set for an Oct. 1 release. At first glance, it appears to be a pretty standard announcement—a new, even crisper and more pristine looking version of what we named the #2 horror movie of all time. Ah, but then you see the running time …

All home video versions of The Shining out there today have a running time of 144 minutes, which is generally regarded as the standard version of the film. The Warner Bros. press release, on the other hand, says the following: It contains “Stanley Kubrick’s 146 minute version of the film.”

Those two extra minutes would seem to imply the presence of one famously excised scene in particular—the so-called “hospital scene” at the end of the film, which has Wendy and Danny recuperating in the hospital, where they’re visited by hotel manager Stuart Ullman. In this version of the film, the last shot still returns to the Overlook hotel, to close on the old photograph that contains the specter of Jack Torrance. Said scene is said to have been included in several of the premiere screenings, before the ever-temperamental Kubrick decided to cut it. It’s never been seen again, despite much speculation whether the footage still survived. If this is indeed the 146-minute version of The Shining, that answer could be a yes.