Shutter Island
Martin Scorsese
Paramount Pictures
3/5 stars
Director Martin Scorsese, best known for his crime thriller masterworks (Goodfellas, The Departed) and haunting character studies (Raging Bull, Taxi Driver), tackles a new set of genres with his latest film, Shutter Island.
Adapted from an excellent, palpably exciting 2003 page-turner from author Dennis Lehane, Scorsese pays homage to Alfred Hitchcock, paranoia thrillers and the B-movie schlock of the 1940s and ’50s.
He casts good pal and frequent collaborator Leonardo DiCaprio as United States Marshal Edward “Teddy” Daniels.
Daniels and his partner, Chuck Aule (Mark Ruffalo) have arrived on Shutter Island, home to the Ashecliffe Hospital for the Criminally Insane to investigate the disappearance of a patient, one whom the head physician, the pipe-smoking Dr. John Cawley (Sir Ben Kingsley), believes has escaped with an Ashecliffe accomplice.
Yet, as the plot thickens, Daniels and Aule suspect that there are grislier happenings on the island. Lehane’s throat-grabbing bestseller gained much acclaim for its tense atmosphere, compelling mystery and whopper of a twist ending.
The film version pales to the superior source material, especially in regards to the central mystery. The novel revealed clues cryptically. The film accentuates each hint with blaring obviousness.
Those who’ve never cracked the spine of a whodunit will have little trouble predicting the outcome by the hour mark.
Another more concerning mystery to grapple with: how editor Thelma Schoonmaker, Scorsese’s go-to cutter and a three-time Oscar winner, manages to bring the film together so clumsily.
There are glaring continuity errors between shots. Schoonmaker doesn’t make the images flow. Instead, they seem to pile on top of each other.
Thankfully, despite the editing glitches and far-too-predictable trajectory, Scorsese is the star of Shutter Island.
He doesn’t act in his own picture but he’s the ringmaster of creating Hitchcockian dread and unease. Giving much homage to the master of suspense, Scorsese inserts many nightmarish (sometimes unrelentingly scary) sequences and images.
For the unabashed trippiness of Island’s atmosphere, the film is glorious to watch. Scorsese also manages to insert classic B-movie staples: rats, foul weather, villains grabbing the protagonist as he walks down a darkened corridor.
It’s a twisty mind-bender, even if much of the psychological mystery barely recedes from the surface.
For instance, DiCaprio as Daniels is riveting, but even though his character is a widower, frequently haunted by his experiences as a Dachau liberator in the Second World War, the film explores his character through DiCaprio’s facial expressions.
His scars underneath are more ambiguous and receive little focus.
Regardless, most schlock doesn’t aspire to have rich characterization.
And Shutter Island is schlock.
But, it’s excellently performed, stylishly orchestrated, compulsively watchable schlock.
It’s best to read the novel before watching the film.
The book’s first-rate. The movie is just an A-quality B-picture.