Is Warner Bros. booking Room 237 again?

The Los Angeles Times—harbingers of last week's CW/BATTLE ROYALE story—is reporting that Warner Bros is "quietly" (or not so much anymore) entering development on a prequel to THE SHINING with SHUTTER ISLAND writer Laeta Kalogridis producing and scripters James Vanderbilt (ZODIAC) and Bradley Fischer. 

The Times writes "the film would focus on what happened before Jack Torrance, his wife and psychic son arrived at the haunted retreat..." Presumably, they mean what happened at the Overlook, itself; which both the novel and Kubrick's picture make fairly clear. Will the film, then, be in the vein of "same thing happened once before" prequels like last year's THE THING and THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE: THE BEGINNING? Hopefully not. Kalogridis and Vanderbilt are both talents and if we have to revisit, hopefully they can find something worth revisiting.

If this goes ahead, the timing is certainly appropriate, as there's a bit of a SHINING renaissance on its way. Stephen King is preparing to release his grown-up Danny Torrance sequel, DR. SLEEP, and Rodney Ascher's doc, ROOM 237, about the varied interpretations of the Kubrick film has found plenty of acclaim (no release date from IFC just yet). 

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