Who said Noirs were dead?

Rating: 10/10 (24 May 2010)

Scorsese's genial work needs no introduction. Every full-feature film he has made in the last twelve odd years has been brilliant in some way or other. Shutter Island, his latest installment, is an instant classic. Having read a few reviews that chastised the film this reviewer feels the need to give the work the praise it deserves.
Set in the 1950's, an age when, regarding attire, people dressed in much more stylish fashion than we do nowadays, Shutter Island pits the viewer with the usual trench-coats, police uniforms with flappy raincoats, tweed suits, hats, flowery female dresses and the rest that have now gone out of wear. Another aspect that brings the 50's back to life is the automobiles – we also get a shot of such a vehicle in Shutter Island.
But the visual experience we are treated to with this movie does not end with the car and wardrobe, or the beautiful asphalt buildings of the penitentiary. The Island itself is worthy of mention. It possesses an air of insanity that is prescient from the very beginning, when the viewer's ear is invaded with overtly melodramatic insertions as the camera approaches the Island and DiCaprio and Ruffalo are arriving. Soon enough, however, we will begin to comprehend the significance of these details.
Shutter Island is in much reminiscent of Hitchcock's work. While the movie is not set in black-and-white, it is more Noir than many Noirs were in their heyday. Not only does the music fit in with this assertion; as well as the shots of the cliffs and island, and of the surrounding water; but the progression of the story, that goes from mysterious to incomprehensible soon enough, transcending the real and reaching hallucinatory plains, aids in creating a masterpiece of an ethereal, ephemeral thriller.
To be sure, such an ambitious project would not have been feasible had the director not only been intimately involved with Hitchcock's and other master thriller-makers' work but also without the aid of a stellar set of actors. DiCaprio, Ruffalo, Kingsley, the incomparable Sydow, as well as the female cast all stand tall and play their parts to full effect. This could be one of the trickiest parts DiCaprio has approached in his whole career, and he has succeeded. It is a pleasure to appreciate the development he has undertaken since his frail days in 1999's Titanic.
In summary: screaming Hitchcock, Shutter Island is an assault on the senses, an epic psychological journey into the most elusive, extreme confines of the mind. It deserves a place among the best such films being made in recent years. 10/10