Shutter Island (R); Scorsese, 138 mins.
Scorsese proves he’s the grand master with this glamorous homage to the psychological thrillers of the 1950s. Leonardo DiCaprio delivers an astonishing performance as Teddy Daniels, a U.S. Marshal sent to investigate the disappearance of a mental patient from a New England asylum on the mysterious Shutter Island. When a hurricane traps Teddy and his new partner (Mark Ruffalo) on the island, they begin to discover all is not as it appears. Scorsese has fun with the material (based off Dennis Lehane’s novel of the same name) and it shows. Musical cues and familiar plot devices are reminiscent of Hitchcock, and the it-was-a-dark-and-stormy-night-ness of it all tells the audience right off the bat that this is a gothic ghost story of the mind, a journey well worth taking. And don’t worry: as soon as you think you’ve figured it out, you realize you haven’t.
Grade: A
