Shutter Island - Mind officially blown
Okay, so I'm late to the game. But I just recently saw Shutter Island for the first time and boy does it leave you confused at times
But first, let's go into the plot.
In 1954, U.S. Marshal Edward "Teddy" Daniels (Leonardo DiCaprio) is sent to the Ashecliffe Hospital for the criminally insane on *dun dun DUNNNHHH* (ominous music here) Shutter Island. He and his partner, Chuck Aule (Mark Ruffalo) are there to investigate the disappearance of one of the "patients" there: one Rachel Solando. We get a sense early on that Marshall Daniels has been damaged in the past, but we don't quite know how.
He meets the lead psychiatrist, Dr. John Cawley (Ben Kingsley)—an outwardly pleasant sort of man but who gives off an air that something is definitely being concealed. We also get some very interesting dreams involving Daniels' wife, Dolores Chanal (Michelle Williams).
What follows is a very compelling, though often confusing series of events that cause both Daniels and the viewer to seriously question everything they know up to this point.
And it should come as no surprise that this is a Martin Scorsese film. It's very stylized, though not to the level of becoming more art than story. In fact, the stylistic choices made here very much underpin the whole essence of the story. I can't go into much detail without spoiling a very well-told mystery.
It's enough to say that, in a movie that forces you to question what is really going on, the stylized direction helps to create a sort of disconnect from reality to enhance that feeling of uncertainty.
And even the end of the film leaves the viewer with questions.
But again, I can't go into that too much without spoiling something.
Very well done Mr. Scorsese.
Personally, though I don't expect I'll watch it again, the solid atmosphere and effective mind game gets this one a solid 9 / 10.
Shutter Island is rated R for disturbing violent content, language and some nudity.
