http://www.apple.com/trailers/paramount/shutterisland/

With Leo.

After only watching this trailer, I'm pretty sure this movie is going to be hardcore awesome.

Doesn't really look like a typical Scorsese film.

Looks like fun. Scorcese, to the best of my recollection, never does anything close to the horror genre, so this oughtta be good.

I feel like this movie is worthy of having its own thread discussion rather than just being part of the "what is the last movie you saw? thread.

After seeing the movie my rating of it was "very good." After thinking and talking about it with others, I've upgraded it to "fantastic."

There's just a ton of stuff going on there. So, here we go...

Spoiler warning: the stuff in the below spoiler tags has lots of spoilers so don't read if you don't want to be spoiled.

Spoil.


Did anybody have even an inkling that Leo was actually a prisoner/patient? Even at the end when he went to the lighthouse and the doctor started explaining it to him, I was still a little unsure. But once you know the doc is telling the truth, it changes your perception of everything that happened before.

-the doctor being "on vacation"
-the body language of the guards when they first got to the island
-not allowing access to personal files
-the vision of his wife bleeding from the stomach
-"why are you all wet, baby?"
-the note that said "run"
-obviously the conversation with the prisoner in C block
-the conversation with the warden in the jeep

Just so much great stuff. It's definitely one of those movies that if you watched it a second time (and I definitely plan to) you would have a totally different experience.

I want to talk about two things in particular.

What was the meaning behind the note that said "run?" What did she know and what was she trying to say?

The last line of the movie: "Which would be worse, to live as a monster or to die as a good man?"

This means he's making a conscious decision to remain in his alternate reality, right? He'd rather fool himself into thinking he's a federal marshall than have to live with the idea that he's to blame for the murder of his children. And that's why the doc calls out to him as he walks away, because he understands what he's doing. Right?

I haven't seen the movie. This plot twist was pretty obvious even from the trailer.

Well then.


(p.s. if you get to Ron Mexico's post and don't want to be spoiled, don't read any further.)

Havent seen this yet, but interesting story .....

LANCASTER, Calif. — Authorities say a man was stabbed in the neck with a meat thermometer after asking a woman to silence her cell phone during a screening of the film "Shutter Island" at a Southern California movie theater.

Los Angeles County sheriff's spokesman Steve Whitmore says the stabbing happened Feb. 27 during a screening of the Martin Scorsese film in Lancaster. He says the two suspects remain at large.

Whitmore says the victim had complained about a woman sitting nearby who was talking on her phone during the movie. He says the woman left with two men, but the men returned minutes later and stabbed the victim in the neck.

Two other people in the theater came to the victim's aid and also were hurt. The man was hospitalized with serious injuries.

The sheriff's office says it knew the weapon used was a meat thermometer because the suspects left it behind. No further details were released.

I added spoilers.

My friend already gave away the ending to me, so I knew the twist before I read your post

I can see the scope of the 10 day waiting period law is about to be expanded

I feel the exact way you do. The more I thought about it, it really did get better in my mind.

Even in the lighthouse, I kept saying..."Wow, hey are still trying to **** with his head"...."Wait, he is a patient, no he's not, yes he is"


To me, "RUN" meant, they are giving you run of the grounds, take this chance and try to escape

And the last line, your description of it is the exact way I thought it was supposed to be.

No spoilers because eff you if you clicked on this thread and haven't seen the movie yet.

JJJ, you put that Leo was responsible for the death of his kids. Do you mean because he wasn't picking up on the clues from the wife that she was crazy? Am I remembering this wrong? The wife did do the kids right?

I do love the rest of your analysis. I think I would drive myself batty if I read into movies the way you deftly do. I just try to pick up things here and there and enjoy the ride.

I was still wondering in the lighthouse if he was a Fed or prisoner.

Heh.

Right, he blamed himself because she told him stuff like it felt like there was a bug crawling in her brain and he knew something was wrong with her, but he just ignored it instead of getting her help.

ahhh, yes. He was normal before all that trauma, just an absentee, typical hubby from that time period.

But yes, you continue to impress with anal-ysis

Thanks?

Coming tomorrow: the significance of the missing prisoner!

I knew about half way through that he was what we were seeing wasnt real. i wasnt sure if he had been insane the whole time or he was dreaming. if i'd had time to think i would have known for sure as marty would never take the easy way out.

as for the last line. i took it to meant that he was sane, he knew what he'd done, and where he was, but that he was going to pretend that he was still crazy so they would kill him and put him out of his misery.

this is the general consensus I've found from discussions with people (you know. soylent green)



one thing that I've brought up (well actually when we were walking out of the movie some random person said, "I don't get why he blew up the car". One of my party said (to me quietly), "Oh. because HE was the pyromaniac." after hearing that, it seems obvious.) which I've found that people tend to NOT agree with is that Leo was the pyromaniac. He blew up the car (for pretty much no reason). He was "playing" with the matches when he went to find Rorschach. He was the one who was burning down the house (watch out). That last one is speculation but it's the logical conclusion.


the "run" thing was her letting him know the whole thing was a trick (she knew he was a patient not a visitor) so he should "run". Trust me. I'm qualified to give the definitive position on this.

Think again.

I thought it was to create a distraction so he could make his way over to the lighthouse. I could be wrong though, maybe it is just because he's a pyro.

I wondered about the killing him part. Is that what the doc was getting at when he was saying they had this last ditch effort to save him? But I wouldn't say it as pretending to be crazy; I think he would need to legitimately convince himself of the alternate reality to die a good man. And the doc mentioned he had come back to reality and then relapsed a few times, so it was obviously in him to go back.



But there wasn't any real fire, right? That was just a story he invented. I thought his visions of his wife turning to ash had something to do with his traumatic death camp experience and they sort of blended together.

As for the car explosion, I thought as Gov did.


Also, I don't really have anything except questions regarding the significance of the missing prisoner, but I'll do those later.

I dont think there was a missing prisoner. Wasnt that just part of the fantasy he created for himself? In his world, where he was there investigating, the missing prisoner was the man who set the fire that killed his wife. It was all part of an unsolvable mystery he created for himself in an effort to never stop searching and accept the reality of what he'd really done. (think memento).

When in fact, leo was the missing prisoner.

That's what HE said it was. wasn't much of a distraction though. All it did was call everyone's attention to him. Anyway, considering that the fake guy with the scar, Andrew Laeddis, was the pyro who started the fire and that Edward Daniels and his name are actually just anagrams for each other, it seems fairly safe to say that they might share more than just the name anagram situation.

I don't know why you think the fire itself was made up.


no they're not killing him. they're giving him a lobotomy to make him not be a threat to prisoners/staff (this is what BK said they would have to do in the lighthouse). sorry I guess I didn't read that other post thoroughly.

a suggestion: use spoilers in the "what movie did you see" thread, but for threads devoted to a movie use "SPOILERS WITHIN" as the tagline & be done with it. really, if someone doesn't want to know about a movie, they shouldn't be opening a thread that only discusses it & no others.

It was a bumped thread from July before the movie was out.

This was a fantastic movie.

I'm glad nobody spoiled the twist for me before I saw it. I'm usually pretty good at guessing twists, but I had no idea on this one. I knew something was going on, but I stopped trying to figure it out about 1/3 of the way in and just enjoyed the ride. I can't wait to watch it again on DVD.


The use of music to build tension was excellent. It actually reminded me a lot of The Shining in that sense.

same thing, really.

I know that Leo was the missing prisoner. My questions had more to do with how much of the details of the missing prisoner story were provided by Leo and how much were provided by the doctor. Like how the missing prisoner had the background of creating a whole new world in the prison, convincing herself that she was still at home. That seems like something the doctor would want in there to make it more believable to Leo that he's been doing the same thing, which would make it easier to get him to come back to reality.




I thought the fire was the story Leo invented for his wife's death. But she didn't die in a fire, he shot her. Did he burn the house down after?

this might be right. it's been a while since I've seen it but I thought they moved to the "country" because of the fire. something to do with her health after the smoke inhalatiion



the fire was always about the apartment building. Laeddis was the super. so leo said

Really enjoyed this movie.




I was 60% sure he was a patient until he the conversation in the cave with the "real Rachel". The drugging him story seemed believable to me so it was nice that I got surprised after all.

Agreed that he was sane but decided he can't cope at the end. If you notice how nice the place looks in that scene, whereas before it was so grim and gloomy, I took that to mean his state of mind. When it was grim he was uneasy and lying to himself and when it was nice at the end he was sane.

I forgot about the guards being so nervous at the start. So well done that it fits in perfectly for both scenarios, when Leo first arrives it makes the place seem even more ominous with how they act and now that we know it also makes perfect sense. I definitely need to watch this a second time.



He was never a pyro. Kingsley says at the end, even when his wife burned down his apartment, he still ignored it and just moved them to the countryside. She was the one who burnt it. It was another glaring sign that he ignored so probably why he made up an elaborate story about it in his reality.



I'm sure there can be loads of reasons as to why he did it but yea I thought this too. It showed everyone running towards it and he made an easy scamper to the lighthouse, after his halucinations distracted him.

I didn't think of that; good call.



I don't know why I missed this part (must've been trying to get that last piece of popcorn), but it makes sense.

Also, what was the "rule of four"? Was there a meaning to that? His wife and three kids making up the 4?

After doing a little googling, the most common answer seems to be that two names actually have four names. Apparently this is clear in the book, but the movie just kind of blasts through it.

Also, an anagram for Shutter Island is Truths and Lies.

Makes sense and that's pretty cool.

Obviously I don't remember this part. I'll have to remember this when I re-watch it. It's already saved on my netflix queue

Actually my girlfriend doesn't remember that part. So basically you, JJJ and my gf, everyone I've talked to about this movie doesn't remember it so I'm starting to second guess myself.

It made sense to me when you said it, but I just read this:

"Also the symbolism of fire and water tells you when he is hallucinating (fire) and when he is lucid (water trickling through). The delusion he concocts to save himself from accepting the truth is that his wife died in a fire. All the people he talks to surrounded by fire is a hallucination - the woman in the cave, the patient in the cell, the scarred faced man who he thinks killed his wife, the car blowing up - all a delusion. The water symbolizes reality trying to break through. He is afraid of water - (his kids were drowned, they all died in the lake). Also at the start he says he gets 'sea sick' - he is mortally afraid of water. He has to swim to get to the lighthouse."

I never even thought about that before. The one problem I have with this theory is the holocaust stuff. Was he not really a soldier?

When they were explaining to him his reality they said "We don't know if you really killed those soldiers" Which would imply that they knew he was a soldier but just not about what really happened that day.

I'm still sure there was a fire in the apartment but I need to find out.

Right or not that is a cool a theory and makes sense. This movie is so much fun.

Just bought this today. Still a great movie.

One thing I noticed, and I'm not sure if was done for any reason, but it just stuck out to me.

When they give up their firearms in the beginning. Shihan/Chuck struggles getting his holster off his belt. Something I don't think a real marshall would have trouble doing.

In the making of, that point is mentioned as deliberate, and one of the movie's first clues.

Little touch I liked was in the opening sequence, with the characters on the boat, before they get to the island. When they're on deck, the water in the background looks like it's rear projection, another nice reference to the type of movie Shutter Island is homaging.

Watched this for the first time last night. Pretty awesome. I had heard bad reviews and wasn't expecting the greatness that I felt when the end was shown. I was truly baffled as to whether they were fucking with him or if they were actually telling him the truth.

I am still unsure if the woman in the cell was a patient or if she was a nurse who was assigned to play that role. Thoughts?

Most of the analysis in this thread I agree with. Great Movie!

Just watched this. I was doing ok until I started reading this thread and then my head exploded.

watched this tonight, really enjoyed it.

Want to read some of this so this is essentially a bump cuz I am tired

just watched this movie. damn fine flick. I actually started thinking that he was probably a patient there and was imagining a lot of the stuff pretty early, but like somebody else said, they kind of made it more believable with the cave convo and making it seem possible that he was really investigating something and they were messing with him.



no you're right. she tried to kill herself by setting the fire in the apartment.

Can you be a little more specific why you disliked it so much it to give it a 5.5? That's a ridiculously low rating for one of the better movies to come out of 2010. If you weren't engaged or entertained your mind must've been elsewhere.

I didn't feel for a minute that the movie was dragging being 160min long. I also don't think you can slowly unveil that type of twist. I think it works better as a "Oh sh*t I KNEW it" type of reaction from the audience. When it ended at the theater, everyone was talking amongst themselves "Did you see that coming?" etc. That's a good thing. Sure it had a lot of flashbacks or jump scenes but doesn't that help portray the character's state of mind throughout?

I think whenever there is a movie with a big twist ending, people focus too much on that twist ending. I think there's enough going on with this movie to keep you involved whether you know the truth about Leo or not.

It's an interesting point that sometimes you should be able to know, or at least have a good idea about, what the twist is going to be...if it's too far out of nowhere, it could feel like the writer/director was just trying too hard to be tricky.

I think that movies like this are always somewhat dampened (poor word choice, sorry) by the fact that almost everyone knows that there's a twist before even watching it.

Yeah, or it invalidates everything that came before it. I still don't totally understand what was going on in The Usual Suspects.

merc, you could have posted this in the "last movie you watched" thread. these guys have already beaten this particular horse to death; you've just given them an excuse to look at more pictures of leo. if you had put it in the "last picture show" thread it would have come & gone more smoothly.

Good points made about the twist aspect, in that completely obscuring the twist makes you say "WTF?", rather than "Aha!". Although I had done my best to remain spoiler-free prior to watching this movie, it couldn't be helped that aspects of the twist (but not the specifics) had been revealed in what little I read of it.

It's pretty standard for me not to read about a film before seeing it, so I don't get overly influenced by other opinions.

I'm pretty sure my harsh score is based as much on my partial disappointment with Scorcese, as I feel this film is a real come-down compared to The Departed. Obviously, I have higher expectations for Scorcese than, say, Tony Scott and his "oeuvre".

As mentioned, though, I do consider the overall execution of the film to be above average. There is plenty to like about it: Set design, for example. Lighting was also well done.

Edit: Hi, Qyayqi. I posted it in the other thread first and was prodded enough to bring it here. And there is no such thing as "too many Leo" pictures...

I read the book first, so I can't say what it's like without knowing the twist already, but I feel like already knowing might have added something to the movie. I was mostly watching to see how well they translated the book, and I think they did an excellent job. There's also lots of small things you notice if you already know who's who. Especially things with Ruffalo.

I'll come back to this. I really like that ending...I'm just not ready to spend the next ten minutes explaining why. I have a dog to worry about now.



I guess I'll translate again. Unlike JJJ in the other thread, qyayqi was, in fact, fucking around.