Review of Shutter Island (2010) by Mitchell B — 28 Aug 2014

I am not really a fan of Martin Scorsese. His films do not really interest me and ones that I have actually seen I found to be boring. However, Shutter Island is the exception. I found this to be a great mystery story and the one Scorsese film that I really enjoy. It has a great look to it, great atmosphere, great score great suspense, and a great cast.

The cast is great. Leonardo DiCaprio gives a great performance here. DiCaprio gets a bad rap from many people because of Titanic. I personally did not think he was bad in Titanic. It is just that the script that he was given was not very strong. Plus, ever since then DiCaprio has definitely proven that he is a great actor by doing films like Inception, Django Unchained, The Departed, and this film. Honestly, Shutter Island has actually become my favorite DiCaprio film. I even like this film more than Inception. In this film he plays a feral marshal and World War II veteran named Teddy Daniels. He is hired to investigate a disappearance on Shutter Island.

Mark Ruffalo is in this too as Teddy's partner. Ruffalo does a great job here as well. I think he does a great job in anything he is in even if the film is bad. Mark Ruffalo is one of my favorite actors working. Although, truthfully I actually could not tell that was Mark Ruffalo at first. He looks very young here compared many of his other recent films like Zodiac or the Avengers. Ben Kingsley also stars on the film as the doctor who runs the island who may be more than who he appears. Kingsley does a good job at playing a creepy and shady doctor.

The main thing I love about this film is the atmosphere. This film has a very eerie and mysterious atmosphere to it. The look of Shutter Island was quite creepy. This place really looked like a real insane asylum. The actual crazies were creepy too. I would not want to be around any of those people. The score also really helped create the atmosphere. The score was brilliant. At times I thought the music was a little over-played, but overall the music was great.

I was also very intrigued by the story and mystery behind Shutter Island. It was fun watching Teddy try to uncover everything. The third act was very fun until we get to the very end. This is the one issue with the film. There is a very M. Night Shyamalan esc twist that I did not entirely buy. However, it did not ruin the film for me. Some people will probably not like the twist, but I did not outright hate it. This is probably because I saw it coming. I got spoiled to the ending online before seeing the film so I was somewhat prepared going in. I still thought was a great movie.

Overall, I highly recommend Shutter Island. It is both my favorite Scorsese film as well as my favorite DiCaprio film. It is a fun and eerie mystery film. You should enjoy yourself.