Shutter Island An Excellent Suspenseful Thriller

Rating: 8/10 (12 June 2010)

Shutter Island is an excellent suspenseful thriller with some flaws which I'll get into later but the good more than outweighs that bad in this one. Director Martin Scorsese is admirable in making Shutter Island giving audiences nearly everything they could expect or want from one of these films. Leonard DiCaprio is great as always as Teddy Daniels a US Marshal on route to a remote island for the criminally insane to investigate the disappearance of a murderess who somehow escaped from her locked hospital room. Or as Ben Kingsley's mysterious head Dr. Crawley explains; "We don't know how she got out of her room. It's as if she evaporated straight through the walls." Leonardo DiCaprio brings an intensity to the role (like in Blood Diamond and The Deaprted to name a couple) and at times vulnerability. He continues to show audiences and critics his talent as an actor. This film is no different. Well done. The rest of the talented cast including Mark Ruffalo, Ben Kingsley, Michelle Williams, Emily Mortimer, and Max von Sydow in a small role are effective as the supporting characters in their limited screen time. Particia Clarkson, Elias Kosteas, John Carroll Lynch, Ted Levine, and Jackie Earl Haely are also very good in their brief extended appearances since most of the story's focus is on DiCaprio which isn't necessarily a bad thing. Shutter Island turned out to be much better than expected. It has an interesting story, suspense, an eerie mood, and atmosphere with strong performances from the cast. The movie also has some nice twists and surprises. One I sort of did suspect and others I found surprising to say the least. So it's better to avoid spoilers and watch this film without knowing too much about the plot for you to truly enjoy Shutter Island. I found this film to be much better than others who disguise themselves as suspense thrillers (The Grudge, The Happening, and Shutter to name a few). I enjoyed that Scorsese didn't heavily rely on CG except for some and instead used for the most part realistic locations and atmosphere to create the suspense. The location they chose for the island was a perfect setting for this story to take place and it added a lot to the movie. The flashback sequences of Teddy's time in World War 2 were an interesting touch that give us some insight into his traumatic past which continues to plague him while on the island. The pace of the movie was a little slow in the beginning before the suspense really started to kick into high gear but overall I can't think of all that much I didn't like about this film. Sure it might have some tiny flaws including a surprise I sort of saw coming but I thought Scorsese still did a good job with the execution of the twist none the less. In some ways Shutter Island reminded me a bit of the Shining because both films used actual locations, surreal images, and atmosphere to create suspense build up instead of relying on CGI. I was impressed with this movie and I plan to watch it again sometime because second viewings I think are needed to fully understand the story so it makes sense. Not that the story itself is very complicated but I believe Shutter Island's worth watching a second time even with a 138 minute running time because the film is that good despite it's few flaws. If you're in the mood for a suspenseful thriller or you're a fan of the genre, you can't go wrong with Shutter Island. It has an intricate story, suspense, twists, surprises, and solid performances by the cast (especially DiCaprio, Ruffalo, and Kingsley) who make this thriller worth the time to watch.