Starring: Leonardo DiCaprio, Michelle Williams, Mark Ruffalo, Ben Kingsley
Director: Martin Scorsese (The Departed, Taxi Driver)
Running Time: 2 hrs 28 min
Release Date: Feb. 19, 2010
Budget: $80 million
Critics’ Thumbs Up: 68%
“…a divinely dark and devious brain tease…” Betsy Sharkey, Los Angeles Times
“…never emotionally involving.” Dana Stevens, Slate
Part Hitchcockian with its moody mysteriousness and part Charlie Kaufman with its haunting, surrealistic dream sequences, Shutter Island is a taut thriller and a fascinating character study. Based on the 2003 novel by Dennis Lehane (Gone Baby Gone, Mystic River) and set in 1954, U.S. marshals Teddy Daniels (DiCaprio) and Chuck Aule (Ruffalo) are assigned to a spooky island off the coast of Massachusetts to investigate a disappearance of a patient at a mental hospital for the criminally insane. While it drags in the middle and is about 20 minutes too long, Shutter Island still engages the audience thanks to its unexpected twists and its frequent flashbacks that subtly and intricately reveal the truth. Ruffalo and Jackie Earle Haley are underused, but DiCaprio excels as a psychologically unraveling, broken man and Williams is particularly effective as his mystifying wife. Exponentially less horrifying than its trailer indicates, Shutter Island instead makes for a mind-bending, intellectually satisfying trip to the movies.
