Why I did not like Shutter Island

28th march, 2011 9:16 pm

p.s-

The views expressed are not entirely mine. I have just edited some viewer's comments on the movie. Nontheless, i totally and completely agree with the views expressed here.

1. I hate to say this as much anyone else but for me this film had a horribly disappoint ending. First before I delve into that I'd like to say that the acting, the writing, the shooting, the film in general as far as quality goes was very good. But the ending was very disappointing. And no I am no idiot or newbie when it comes to film. But I thought the was very much a cop out. Now granted I know this is based off of a novel, hence there are certain restraints to adhering to this novel somewhat. That being said I found the idea of the medical experimentation, mental hospital, nazi experiments, and astray patients much more tantalizing, realistic, and more full of potential. The trick ending where its all in someone's head is done far too often sadly. I was hoping that while it dragged one there at the end it would ultimately reveal he was playing them or that he would stay true and not give in. But that didn't happen. I guess for me I was just expecting something not so cliché for an ending from the likes of Scorsese's genius mind. But all things said and done I definitely can't give this movie all negative remarks, wonderfully acted and scripted. Great atmosphere, shooting, photography, etc. But I feel the ending should have been less cliché.

2. The film makes no damned sense, unless the point of the film is supposed to be that the people running the insane asylum are more insane than the inmates.

For this film to make any sense, you have to accept the premise that psychiatrists who actually care about a mentally ill patient would try to cure such patient by doing things that would drive a sane person crazy; that they would play cruel head games that encourage delusional beliefs. How can any sane person believe that giving Teddy/Andrew evidence to support his delusions is going to cure him of delusions? In fact, as the film progresses, we see Teddy/Andrew getting more deluded, more paranoid, more violent. The role-playing is clearly counter-productive.


And for this film to make any sense, you also have to believe that these same doctors would give a startling degree of freedom to one of the asylum's most violent killers. Andrew/Teddy attacks a patient and knocks out a guard. He blows up a car, for goodness sake! That alone should prove it was insane to give him any freedom to wander alone, even for a short time.

The movie was set up as a mystery - what is the secret of Shutter Island? But the resolution (that Teddy/Andrew was insane all along, and the doctors were pretending to be evil because they thought that would cure him of his delusions) makes no sense. There is nothing worse than a mystery where the solution bends all rules of logic. It reminds me of the following joke:

Dennis Lehane: What is furry, has four legs, purrs, and reads the newspaper every day? Richard Nathan: I don't know. Dennis Lehane: A cat. I lied about the newspaper.

I thought that joke was annoying the first time I heard it, and it's annoying as the basis of the mystery in "Shutter Island."

Furthermore, the resolution is not the result of any actions taken by the protagonist. The role-playing game doesn't lead Teddy/Andrew to discover the truth himself. He is merely a passive listener as the solution is explained to him. The breaks several major rules of screen writing.

And what about the very end? Most people interpret Teddy/Andrew's last line as meaning Andrew is only faking his regression, so that he can get a lobotomy and avoid facing the truth. But if he were faking it, why would he give this away to the doctor playing Chuck? And why are so many people moved by this act of cowardice? Can there be anything more cowardly than someone choosing to get a lobotomy to avoid facing the truth about himself? Are we supposed to empathize with someone who chooses to destroy his own intellect?

I cannot understand how anyone can think this is an intelligent screenplay.


3. Let's break it down simply. The whole movie is a two hour long, twilight zone style "and then he woke up." Everything you watch, all of the characters, all of the story, mean nothing. They are erased at the ending when the protagonist "comes to" and realizes that he's just a murderer. But keep in mind, this isn't any normal crime. It is at once as cliché and as over the top as possible.

There was one fascinating mystery that I hoped would be explained but wasn't. Teddy makes his way to a lighthouse and runs up the stairs to find one of the doctors from the mental hospital in a office.

OK. It's a lighthouse. There's a spiral staircase running through the middle of it. How in the world did the doctor manage to get a desk, chairs, file cabinet, lamps, etc., three stories up a spiral staircase? And why? I'd ask the same question of Scorsese. You and some brilliant actors made this turd.

Why?

4. I just kept thinking that this couldn't have been one of those "it was all a dream" clichés, but sadly it was. The entire film was so redundant that all I could say at the end of the film was: "seriously?" Do NOT waste your money… it will leave you angry and frustrated.

5. I've never been too fond of twist endings, but I felt the twist in this film really made the film entirely pointless.

We spend most of the movie engrossed in a detective story with a few flashback puzzle pieces and are left to wonder how those fit into the twist we all know is coming. The fact we all the twist from the trailer means its basically only a matter of time.

I left feeling hollow and annoyed. What is the point of all this? What are they trying to say about crazy people? In the end Andrew (Teddy for most of the movie) is to be lobotomized, so the message is about how sometimes drugs and respecting patients doesn't work so let's carve them open? Rather than creating an expertly crafted detective story we instead get an obvious twist (even to those who turned the channel every time the trailer was on) that halts the story. I cared about Teddy's demons, wanted him to get off the island but you can't yank the character around into someone else and expect me to still care about him when everything he's been characterized as and experienced has been one big delusion.

It was still an okay film... just apparently not my style of film.