Better than mediocre but not great.

Rating: 7/10 (27 February 2010)

It's hard to knock a movie with a good ending even if the bulk of the movie stinks, which is case for this over-hyped thriller. Much of the movie is exceedingly underwhelming and at times outright boring. The gloomy sets, the hackneyed acting, the dumb dialog all combine to make the first two-thirds of this movie quite bland, the stuff that makes the eyelids feel heavy as you are sinking into slumber-land. Yet something amazing happens. The movie actually turns itself around and becomes an engaging and exciting cinematic event, marked by strong acting by Leonardo Di Caprio as his confused character struggles to unravel the riddle of his very identity. How this movie manages to avoid creative oblivion is fascinating. Somewhere, some how, the director must have realized that he had to turn this movie around to avoid flop-ville. Two problems with the movie is that the sinister characters aren't really all that sinister and that the setting, a psychiatric hospital is, well, a psychiatric hospital. One must remember that when a story is based in a hospital, drama can be taken just so far because along with the doctors and nurses who interact with patients, there is also a virtual army of clerks, housekeepers, accountants and other support staff who actually keep the hospital running. So when watching Shutter Island, one should ask: who is paying the bills, mopping the floor, dealing with account payable and receivables and maintaining the phones? They have a story too but once again it goes untold.