Shutter Island (2010)

Shutter Island made us shudder. This thriller about a couple of 1954 Boston detectives investigating a missing person at a hospital for the criminally insane is very good, though a bit too long. The first time we saw the trailer we shook our heads. But when we saw it was a Martin Scorsese picture, we knew we'd have to see all 138 minutes of it.

Many of Scorsese's movies are difficult to watch (Taxi Driver (1976), Raging Bull (1980), Goodfellas (1990), Cape Fear (1991), The Last Temptation of Christ (1988), Gangs of New York (2002)), some are a pleasure (Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore (1974), The Last Waltz (1978), After Hours (1985), Casino (1995), The Aviator (2004) (the color trickery in the beginning of the latter went right over my head: I ran out of the theatre and complained, "The peas are blue, the grass is blue! Please fix it!" The gimmick is explained in the fifth item on imdb's trivia page), Shine a Light (2008)), and only one won an Oscar, The Departed (2006), but they're all worth seeing. The man knows exactly what to do and when.

We had no idea what was going to happen in Shutter Island; the settings (various Massachusetts locations plus Acadia National Park in Maine) were appropriately creepy, both physically and with weather effects; and the star-studded cast was outstanding.

It's Leonardo DiCaprio's (favorites: What's Eating Gilbert Grape and This Boy's Life (both 1993), The Basketball Diaries (1995), Celebrity (1998), Catch Me If You Can (2002), and The Aviator) story, as the lead detective, and he is amply supported by Mark Ruffalo (I wrote about him in The Brothers Bloom), Ben Kingsley (my new fave is The Wackness), Max von Sydow (he has so many distinguished credits, yet to me, he's Barbara Hershey's older husband who says, "You've been kissing!" in Hannah and Her Sisters (1986)), Patricia Clarkson (good in everything, must-sees include The Station Agent (2003), Far From Heaven (2002), High Art (1998), Good Night, and Good Luck (2005), season 5 of Six Feet Under, Elegy, and Pieces of April), and many others.

No composer is credited; instead, Robbie Robertson, as music supervisor, has rustled up a collection of eerie classical and 1950's pop tracks, three of which you can hear on this link. The screenplay was ably adapted by Laeta Kalogridis (nominated for a Razzie for worst screenplay for Alexander (2004)) from the novel of the same name by Dennis Lehane, who also wrote the novels on which Mystic River (2003) and Gone Baby Gone (2007) were based.

Jack and I both heartily recommend this movie, which displaced Avatar (whose 8 producers included Ms. Kalogridis) and Valentine's Day to open at number one at the box office last weekend.