Skip to main content

"Shutter Island" - movie review


“If I were to sink my teeth into your eye right now, would you be able to stop me before I blinded you?” Dicaprio responds stately “Give it a try”

Four years after “The Departed” , the master comes up with “Shutter Island” . Continuing with his favourite man Dicaprio whom he has indulged in the last 3 occasions before now, master director Martin Scorsese, one of the few men who is capable of enthralling his audiences at times of inconsequential moments of stasis in a movie, delivers again.

Not a single frame of the movie was wasted in “The Departed”, Scorsese was uncompromising in the previous one. He, with his impenetrable genius, pulled our nerves taut and relished in the obstruct sound of discomfort produced by the taut string like nerves in “The Departed”. What can you expect after such a movie?

“Shutter Island” begins with Dicaprio visiting the island. Background score is reminiscent of Black Sabbath’s “Iron Man”. Only this one sounds even more sinister, like two metallic objects sliding over one another in an underground bunker where a giant war machine, something very secretive, is being propelled, but where to?

The aerial panoramic shot with the Jeep approaching the entrance and the background score that seems to end but only prolongs the anxiety (like “voices of the dead” from “kreator”), and never ceases to release you ; The slow motion shot with an old lady signalling Dicaprio to keep his mouth shut, and a nocturnal background score- Scorsese at his best.

Psychotic patients, ones who cannot be treated elsewhere are admitted into Shutter Island. Movie espouses anger, bitter memories, danger, secrets, violence, deception….but above all, it scoops out something old, an archaic feeling. The steamer’s noise as if the water it is on is metallic, the ship whistle and sharp corrosive and piercing background score scoops out something atavistic- a feeling of distress.

Dicaprio is fed the island food, pills and cigarettes. They try to frame him for insanity. His past trauma, wife’s death, a perfect alibi. Movie makes you nervous. Although, the story is slightly predictable, Scorsese’s take on it is sort of oldish. The settings- the general atmosphere of the movie is that of the eighties.

It is odd that the movie should end with the startling revelation that Dicaprio has been in the asylum for over two years and that he withdraws into the schizophrenic word of his, in order to cope with his wife’s murder. It’s a thoroughly enjoyable movie, but quite different from what Scorsese has delivered so far. I am not disappointed that the new movie is not one of his trademark plots, the Good Fellas, Taxi Driver, Departed, Aviator…I like the new movie, an unconventional Scorsese. Was Departed the end of Scorsese as we knew it? if yes, then the end was his magnum opus. And, the new Scorsese is just as good, but not comparable to the old one.

Labels:

Comments

rajarshi samanta said…
dude spoiler aa gaya... revealation hata. rest is really good. after reading your take on the director everyone will try to follow him.
March 23, 2010 at 9:34 PM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Entrenched Prejudices taking the form of Patriotism

What a great way to celebrate the Independence Day? I am bemused, apparently owing to the wide exposure of emotional experiences hitherto seemed innocuous. Delve a little deep into the acquaintance with idea "patriotism", one will invariably be granted with an uncalled inquisition, one gets to stare at a disconcerting vacuum. Why do we brand ourselves with nations that are a mere collection of geographically propelled, culturally augmented, self aggrandizing people? Answer is elusive to many for the reasons best known to them hitherto for their own good are turning skeptical now. Man whom the evolutionists assert shares a common ancestor with chimps and gibbons, naturally after parting his ways with his cousins (chimps, gibbons) choose to retain a comprehensive emotional, physiological and mental disposition. Man, if he ever chooses to embark on a space ship that supposedly travels back in time is bound to diminish his self esteem owing to his impromptu urge to track his ance...
Post a Comment
Read more

Pressure Cooker

Daubing the top of wicks, one by one, with drops of kerosene, J proceeded to rest her newly bought Hawkins pressure cooker on the stove. “Now, you wait for the whistle” said the wealthy neighbouring lady who assisted J that morning with the cooker. With an assumed indifference, J waited for the whistle to lift its bottom over the lid and dance in merry. The kerosene stove, she was told won’t do justice to the cooker; she needed a proper gas stove with sleek finish and hollowed eyes that spewed blue flames with the turn of a switch. The kerosene stove with its twelve tongues brocaded over the epithelial layer of its throat, strung into a circle, served her family since the time of marriage. Her son squatted beside her, giggled and found it amusing as J rubbed his cheeks with her hands warmed before the many tongued stove. In the forlorn house under the wooden roof that leaked, between the pale brown walls that flaked, over the grey rugged tiles that cracked, mother and son lent their t...
Post a Comment
Read more

The moth that covered my face!

My dog came prancing and dancing towards me, I started petting him almost impulsively, took his ears and rolled them over his head hither and thither, stroked his forehead, he was enjoying my attention blushingly perhaps, and he leant his head downwards and was swaying around to get the most of affection. And, suddenly he leapt forward with his hind legs brushing my knee cap, I looked over and he was merrily teasing a moth which apparently fell over on its back and was trying desperately to climb back into a more modest stand. Well, anatomically speaking, the moth had a curved back, smooth with shiny plate like outer skin that extended from front to rear forming quite an armour. It had tiny legs, it was just too hard to find out how many though, drawn so close to the body in a twisted tangled mess, it looked as if, the insect was bothering perhaps a little too much about its legs. On any other occasion, the moth would have leisurely entertained me with its physical theatrics, but this...
Post a Comment
Read more