A story that grips and fills the viewer with doubt

Rating: 8/10 (18 September 2016)

Martin Scorsese has delivered a controversial piece of dark filmmaking with the movie Shutter Island, set in Boston Harbour during the 1950's. The film holds the viewers in its grip with Leonardio DiCaprio playing a federal marshall with his subordinate Mark Ruffalo, who are investigating the disappearance of a patient (prisoner) on the island, a horrible place of infamy contrasting with its beautiful green landscape. It becomes clear that the condescending and smooth doctors played by Ben Kingsley and Max Von Sydow are conducting experiments in eugenics, something he has despised ever since his wartime experience with the Nazis. Or so it seems. Then a series of traumas and flashbacks into his personal life cast doubt on the whole plot. We witness a series of exploits, family related tragedies, a cliffhanging on Shutter Island and a visit with a mysterious woman in a cave. The trauma of a troubled man on a mission casts a heavy doubt on the entire plot and his own personal sanity. A movie well worth seeing.