Let’s Talk About ‘Shutter Island’

As long as everyone is talking about the latest Martin Scorsese thriller, Shutter Island, let’s take a moment to examine it in detail. Martin Scorsese is one of my favorite directors, and if he’s not one of yours, then you probably don’t like movies–or, at least, you don’t like good movies. Fact.

By all definitions of the word, Shutter Island was a good movie. It may even be a great movie–but I didn’t like it…and here’s why:

...just make out already.

1. The love affair between Scorsese and DiCaprio was cute at first, but I can’t detach my brain from the idea that as long as DiCaprio fills the screen, Scorsese’s content. Don’t get me wrong, Leonardo DiCaprio is a fantastic actor…and he does extremely well in this film…but I don’t want to see him go downhill. When a director carries a particular actor with him, and one of the two lose touch with (let’s say…) sanity, you wind up hating at least one of them–and I don’t want that to happen. I used to love Tim Burton and Johnny Depp, and now I think I hate them both.

2. Maybe I’m going crazy, but I feel like I’ve seen this movie before. Not the exact same plot, of course, but without giving anything important away, you’ll probably walk away feeling that you’ve just read the same book by a different author.

3. If the preview doesn’t give away the entire movie to you, you’re probably not paying attention. The first time I saw the preview for Shutter Island, I thought to myself: “Gee, I’ll bet (EDITED FOR SPOILERS)” And I was goddamn right. The film goes at length to make you change your mind about the ending that you’ve already determined is obvious. There are even moments when you doubt yourself, but in the end, you were right…and when a movie is that predictable, you’re not proud of being right.

4. Cliche, cliche, cliche. It seemed like everything about this movie was used before–even in parody–over and over again. This goes along with the notion that I felt as if I’ve seen this movie before. Ben Kingsley’s monologue at the end of the film actually made me laugh, even though it wasn’t supposed to. I felt like I was watching The Simpsons.

5. I liked it too much to hate it. With all of the movies I’ve seen recently, I can’t hate this movie. It was amazingly acted, Scorsese’s directing is almost unparalleled–and it’s one of those films that, even if you don’t really like it, you’ll like it because you have to. I didn’t want to leave the theater. I was captivated through the entire movie…and then when the credits came up at the end, I thought to myself, “Meh. That was worth $10 I guess…”

To put this emotion in perspective, when I saw Avatar, I thought: “Meh, that was worth $15 I guess.” It’s hard to criticize this film because almost everything about it is done right–and done well…

The parts that weren’t done well flopped. There are so many elements tossed around for the sole purpose to throw you off the scent of the predictable twist ending…and by the end of the film, you’re realize this.

The few new elements that this film adds to a played-out plot are really intriguing, but I can’t get my head around the fact that what I expected was nowhere near what I got. Don’t worry, Mr. Scorsese, I still love you.

If you want to ruin the movie for yourself and find out what film matches it almost exactly, scroll over the following TEXT: ***A Beautiful Mind***

…don’t say I didn’t warn you.

–Alex G/

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