Shutter Island

Rated: R

Runtime: 138 min

A Fury of the Film Fan Review

Leonardo Dicaprio plays Teddy Daniels, a federal agent who is investigating the mysterious disappearance of a murderer from a hospital for the criminally insane. When the hospital refuses to help with his investigation it confirms his own personal ideas of the island and reaffirms his own personal agenda. As Daniels gets closer to the truth he begins to doubt everything including his partner, his memories and his own sanity.

Shutter Island is based on the 2003 novel of the same name written by Dennis Lehane. Lehane also wrote Mystic River and Gone Baby, Gone; two novels that were adapted into academy award winning films. The man knows how to write well and when his stories are well produced and attached to some great filmmaking talent there’s no way his stories are going to make a bad movie. This time around Martin Scorsese teams up once again with Leonardo Dicaprio enforcing the age old saying, “if it ain’t broke don’t fix it” and adapts this masterful thriller to the big screen.

At this point we know a film is almost never going to be as good as the book but that doesn’t mean the movie can’t be a beast of its own. Filmmakers can take certain liberties and provide the audience a different experience than the one they would get if they read the book. That being said, you can tell Scorsese took some liberties with this story and presented it very differently for the audience. I haven’t read the book but I can tell the Shutter Island is missing some elements from the novel. How can I tell? For one, based on the descriptions I’ve read for the novel, this movie should have been far darker and edgier than what we were given. Secondly, it felt at times that some scenes got cut in the editing process. Scenes that could have had some of the supporting cast give a little more to the plot than what they did; something I assume was done better in the book.

                                              There sure is a lot of smoking in this movie

But even at his worst Scorsese delivers something better than what we usually find out there. Shutter Island is a thought provoking film that stands above most of the movies in the same genre. A genre saturated with clichés made by people who try to delve into the minds of psychotics only to categorize them as just “crazy”.  Scorsese treats the genre with respect and in the process treats the audience with respect, something many don’t do when giving us a generic look into the mind of people who think differently. Frankly any film that doesn’t treat me like an idiot gets a recommendation from me.

Now if you’re like me, if you have the uncanny ability to tell what an entire movie is about in the first few minutes and I was able to predict the movies ending in the first 10 minutes. That’s my problem, I really do envy those who can see a film and not guess what can happen, those who can enjoy an ending that will satisfy their needs to solve the mystery. It’s like a toddler who reacts surprised every single time a jack in the box springs. The joy on their faces is classic and it’s a reaction I chase like that first high and you chase that dragon..you keep chasing it like you did, wanting that high like you got when you found out Bruce Willis was dead all along in the 6th sense, but you never catch the dragon …you just keep chasing it.

 Through the years I’ve learned that it is not so much the WHY but the HOW…so even though I was able to conclude this films outcome in the first few minutes I still wanted to see how the movie played out and it plays out really well thanks to Leonardo DiCaprio who dominates the screen doing what he does best. It’s also one of the problems. In Jack Nicholson’s, One Flew over the Cuckoo’s nest , Jack is a brilliant lead character but was also surrounded by characters that helped him be even better and in the process helped US the audience build a connection with him. In Shutter Island the supporting cast stand back and are under utilized in this film, sometimes severely so. It almost feels like Scorsese only trusts Dicaprio and didn’t trust enough in his cast to divide up the screen time and let them be actual characters.For example the film has a brief appearance of Jackie Earl Haley who simply ignites the screen to another level and stole the damn scene right under Dicaprio’s nose…the movie needed more of that, more memorable supporting characters, more characters that could help give us more compelling character in Teddy Daniels instead of just accepting him we could have connected with him. Ben Kingsley did a good job as his doctor but nearly as well as he’s been in other roles.

  I’m on the fence with this one, on one side you have a masterful director who brings out the best in Leonardo Dicaprio and on the other side the film has some flaws that even the legendary Scorsese can’t dodge. I enjoy a good mystery and that’s what Shutter Island is. Shutter Island is a film done in a very unique and original way so if you can cope with the slow pacing of the film you just might have a film you’ll truly enjoy. For me, I’m going to keep chasing that Dragon…

RATING: BRONZE FURY AWARD ( ** 1/2 )