***WARNING: Review contains spoilers***
Weeks ago, I made the optimistic insinuation that Shutter Island’s marketing campaign was a scheme of misdirection. I had beliefs that the film’s trailers were deceptive inkblots to a larger illusion rather than slight indications that the great Martin Scorsese had succumbed to telling a predictable story. Well, I was wrong; Shutter Island is as predictable as the previews suggested. Does that make it a terrible film? No. In fact, not even at all.
This film follows Teddy Daniels (Leonardo DiCaprio) and Chuck Aule (Mark Ruffalo), two US marshals who are sent to Shutter Island, a mental institution for the criminally insane, to investigate the disappearance of one of its most dangerous patients. As soon as Teddy digs into the mysteries and conspiracies of the asylum, he begins questioning his own beliefs in American justice and, more importantly, his own sanity.
Shutter Island is a simple parable of guilt and remorse. The trip is one we’ve all taken before in other films, and its ending is easily foreseeable. What makes the movie so enjoyable, though, is how technically rich it is. Scorsese, a director for about 40 years now, knows exactly what he is doing. He borrows elements from Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining to illustrate his ominous playhouse of terror, and he takes techniques from Alfred Hitchcock’s Vertigo to keep us trapped inside. He moves the camera with jarring gusto, and he has no problems fluctuating the levels of color or sound just to further the madness.
It’s unfortunate the screenplay isn’t as intricate as Scorsese’s detailed direction. Shutter Island doesn’t have that openendedness that I was anticipating; I thought I’d be coming out of the theater with deranged thoughts to ponder, but not too many came to mind. About twenty minutes of exposition towards the end of the film are designed to answer all loose ends, and the audience is only left with a few (but interesting) ideas to tinker with.
7.5 out of 10
So does it turn out that Leo is actually a patient in the asylum? It seems like it’ll go that way. Jaki and I still want to see it. I knew how Snakes on a Plane was going to end, but I went to the midnight showing of that one.
To spoil it, yes.
Meh, should still be fun. Don’t worry, you said spoiler alert.