Shutter Island: We Have To Go Back!

In Shutter Island, Teddy Daniels (Leonardo DiCaprio) is a US Marshal investigating the disappearance of a patient and/or inmate from a remote institution for the criminally insane. Creepy noir-ish thriller-y things ensue as Daniels and his partner (Mark Ruffalo)  struggle to uncover the truth. Of course Daniels becomes more and more suspicious of the hospital staff, and of course the audience becomes more and more suspicious of Daniel’s sanity or lack thereof.

The movie looks and sounds awesome. The story, as any good thriller should, makes you wanna know what in tarnations is going on.  I liked almost everything about  Shutter Island, and I wish more big budget studio movies were as daring as it was.

My only complaint, and it’s a big one, is that very similar unraveling sanity plots have been done before, and I think done better (The Machinist and A Tale of Two Sisters, for example).   Perhaps I’d have been completely wowed if I’d seen it ten years ago or had I not seen the “big twist” coming since I saw the trailers for this movie months ago. It might have been a 5 star mind-blower of OMFG proportions.  Sadly, neither of these are true.

TV Casualties Rating: out of 5

Run Time: 138 minutes

Directed by: Martin Scorsese

Written by: Laeta Kalogridis, Dennis Lehane

Starring: Leonardo DiCaprio, Mark Ruffalo, Ben Kingsley

Theatrical Release: 02/19/10

DVD Release: 06/08/10

Production Budget: $80 million

Domestic Gross: $127 million

Metacritic Score: 63/100

Rotten Tomatoes Rating: 68%

Still, the journey is always what matters most, right?  Some of the clues to what’s really going on along the way are subtle and clever – in the opening moments, I pondered why the agent from Seattle spoke with a thick Boston accent.  Others are a bit confusing – I’m still baffled by a mental patient pantomiming drinking a glass of water with an empty hand and then setting the empty glass down in the next shot.  No idea.

There seems to be a split amongst viewers in terms of Teddy’s insanity/sanity. I interpret his final line in the way it would make the most satisfying end to his story – That he is indeed insane and over the course of the film has been made aware of this fact. He murdered his wife after she murdered their children, and rather than live with the awful truth, he is choosing to be lobotomized so that he can be at peace. So while the twist doesn’t give much bang for its buck, the ultimate resolution almost makes up for it with an emotional punch in the gut.

Shutter Island will be released on DVD and BluRay on June 8, 2010. The movie is based on the novel Shutter Island by Dennis Lehane.