Rats…Why’d It Have to be Rats?: A Review of Shutter Island

When I saw trailers for this movie I was really interested. But after talking to my friends I was less interested than I had been. Most of them expressed fears that it would be a demonic horror film, or that it would be a movie that kept you jumping throughout. For whatever reason I did not get these same perceptions from the trailer. And without sounding to arrogant, I was right. The scariest part was when there were a couple thousand rats (rats are to me what snakes are to Indiana Jones) wriggling around on some rocks and making the horrid little rat noises. This movie is in no way scary, and is only rated R for some excess blood and a couple of F bombs. Other than that, it is just a great Scorsese thriller. Leonardo DiCaprio lives up to his Academy Award winning status, and Mark Ruffalo and Ben Kinglsey also turn in noteworthy performances. The plot has more layers than an onion and there are multiple twists and turns.

Because of the nature of this movie, I fear that I will not be able to talk more about it without giving away or at the very least hinting at what happens in the hybrid mystery-thriller plot. If you don’t care or have already seen the movie, by all means, keep reading on. But if you would like to see the movie unbiased and unprejudiced, please stop reading here and take my recommendation to see it.

Shutter Island
(4.5 out of 5)

SPOILER ALERT

The plot reminded me a lot of M. Night Shyamalan’s The Sixth Sense. The way that you are completely immersed into another person’s psyche, their very reality, is truly a testament to great writing and acting.

Even so, this movie was all over the place. From a knock on HUAC and the communist witch hunts of McCarthyism to a one-on-one chat with the warden who apparently reads Nietzsche when he isn’t dealing with the crazies, to a critique on the inhumane lengths people will go to in an attempt to gain power (Nazi concentration camps, North Korean and Soviet testing) this movie covers a gamut of highly charged political and ethical topics. In doing so, it succeeds in diverting your attention from what is going on in the asylum and to the conspiracy theories that DiCaprio concocts or the affects of the atrocities he has encountered. When it is all said and done, you may need to watch Dumb and Dumber or Napoleon Dynamite just to give your mind a break.

This is a movie that cannot be fully understood unless experienced. The web that Scorsese constructs is pulls you in without your knowledge. While some parts were a bit unsatisfying, a second viewing may tie up some loose ends. But it will be a little while before my mind stops spinning, so that second viewing will have to wait for the DVD release.



-Nuss