The Horror of Shutter Island
Many audiences often mistakenly put a film into a different category that originally intended. A few people already called the film “Shutter Island” a psychological thriller. While it’s not far from the label, I would consider it more of a horror film than anything else.
Right away, it starts out with a foreboding atmosphere that is overwhelming as the films moves along like a freight train gaining speed, momentum. It starts out with a dramatic touch of the gothic with the surrounding waters splashing against the ferry taking the two federal marshals to Shutter Island.
What more, the lavish seas gives a feeling of loneliness as if you’re shut away from the rest of the known world.
You get the picture in the first scenes as someone describes the island in 1954… the only way you can reach it is by boat. And you can see there is no other way off it due to walls of rocks clipping around the edges. It is a deadly sight. Feels like a trap within a trap as you step on the island for the first time, leaving you with an uncomfortable feeling.
It is known that the best selling author of the novel Dennis Lehane said that his book is a homage to gothic settings such as the castle-like fortress of the prison, and he adds that it is inspired by the 1956 film Invasion of the Body Snatchers. Was “Shutter Island” intended as a horror film? Yes, it was.
But this is how horror films should be made. Long time director Martin Scorsese creates a very complex layering of plot that you can peel away the further you dig into the morose findings on Shutter Island. There is plenty of mood that greets the characters as if they stepped into a haunted house filled with shadows and threads of darkness that seems to choke you at every turn.
Not only that, there is also the hellish storm that slaps against the island as an angry mother would to a child. It is the same feeling of the terrible storm which often plagues the old Roger Corman adaptations of the Edgar Allan Poe stories in the 1960s starring Vincent Price… you remember the cold whispers of the storm outside, the cutting winds snapping against the windows and ghostly presence of a cemetery? You see all of these trappings in the Shutter Island movie.
There is image piling on images throughout the film. You can get the first glimpses of World War II which plagues the character U.S. Marshal Edward "Teddy" Daniels played by Leonardo DeCapio where there are many bodies laying stone dead in concentration camps, and everything has a grayish, grainy quality to it. You can see Daniels’ wife being blown away like ashes in his dreams as she is a victim of a fire accident which occurred several years ago. You see glimpses of “Saturn Devouring His Son” painting by Spanish artist Francisco Goya offering another view of hell as the paintings were often considered ghoulish by critics. It is considered part of the Black Paintings.
There’s the nice touch with the lighthouse standing in the mists of rocks. (Though it was never explained how the characters reach the place except crossing the water). But it’s a nice image that adds to the already dreadful picture.
But it is the spiraling mystery which ensnares Daniels as he goes deeper into the mind set of the island only to find there are many things still left in darkness. And he learns more about the island--he believes a government conspiracy is being held here against the will of patients as are treated the same way by Nazi groups in the 1940s. As experiements.
You can see an appearance of Max Von Sydow playing a very secretive doctor, an actor best known as the priest in the ultra horror film “The Exorcist.” Even Ben Kingsley, who plays the head shrink in the facility, glitters with glaring menace every time he sneers, like a man hiding his thoughts.
It’s nice to see how the film twists and turns into something unexpected and it is more of a journey for the lead character who learns about something in himself. There is no place for him to run at the end of the film. And he is faced with the greatest monster: himself. The film is directed with a pivoting sharpness that drags you along through a maze of darkness.
It can be argued that the film is strictly a psychological thriller which would probably result in more viewers coming to see the film in theaters. However, the gothic type of settings along with the lead character growing more aware of his losing sanity is very much worthy of H.P. Lovecraft, whose stories always ended with an anti-climax of characters doubting themselves. And often shuddering at the insignificance of the universe around them. Calling “Shutter Island” a horror film shouldn’t be an insult. Calling it a horror film, however, would most likely bring cat calls from other critics. That's too bad.
There’s a very interesting last line Daniels makes at the end of the film: he asks whether it is better to "live as a monster, or die as a good man.” And it’s a very powerful scene. I didn’t even mind DeCapio in this film as he is trying his best to make a good performance under the directorial skill of Scorsese. I rank him along with Brad Pitt as actors who do at least try to confront very challenging roles.
But why would anyone be ashamed of calling it a horror film? It’s a perfectly good one that knows how to build tension since there's a good director adding some respectability to the genre. It’s an underrated film at best. Horror fans shouldn’t pass up a good treat as they will be given an excellent story filled with fantastic images that would make you shiver.
Right away, it starts out with a foreboding atmosphere that is overwhelming as the films moves along like a freight train gaining speed, momentum. It starts out with a dramatic touch of the gothic with the surrounding waters splashing against the ferry taking the two federal marshals to Shutter Island.
What more, the lavish seas gives a feeling of loneliness as if you’re shut away from the rest of the known world.
You get the picture in the first scenes as someone describes the island in 1954… the only way you can reach it is by boat. And you can see there is no other way off it due to walls of rocks clipping around the edges. It is a deadly sight. Feels like a trap within a trap as you step on the island for the first time, leaving you with an uncomfortable feeling.
It is known that the best selling author of the novel Dennis Lehane said that his book is a homage to gothic settings such as the castle-like fortress of the prison, and he adds that it is inspired by the 1956 film Invasion of the Body Snatchers. Was “Shutter Island” intended as a horror film? Yes, it was.
But this is how horror films should be made. Long time director Martin Scorsese creates a very complex layering of plot that you can peel away the further you dig into the morose findings on Shutter Island. There is plenty of mood that greets the characters as if they stepped into a haunted house filled with shadows and threads of darkness that seems to choke you at every turn.
Not only that, there is also the hellish storm that slaps against the island as an angry mother would to a child. It is the same feeling of the terrible storm which often plagues the old Roger Corman adaptations of the Edgar Allan Poe stories in the 1960s starring Vincent Price… you remember the cold whispers of the storm outside, the cutting winds snapping against the windows and ghostly presence of a cemetery? You see all of these trappings in the Shutter Island movie.
There is image piling on images throughout the film. You can get the first glimpses of World War II which plagues the character U.S. Marshal Edward "Teddy" Daniels played by Leonardo DeCapio where there are many bodies laying stone dead in concentration camps, and everything has a grayish, grainy quality to it. You can see Daniels’ wife being blown away like ashes in his dreams as she is a victim of a fire accident which occurred several years ago. You see glimpses of “Saturn Devouring His Son” painting by Spanish artist Francisco Goya offering another view of hell as the paintings were often considered ghoulish by critics. It is considered part of the Black Paintings.
There’s the nice touch with the lighthouse standing in the mists of rocks. (Though it was never explained how the characters reach the place except crossing the water). But it’s a nice image that adds to the already dreadful picture.
But it is the spiraling mystery which ensnares Daniels as he goes deeper into the mind set of the island only to find there are many things still left in darkness. And he learns more about the island--he believes a government conspiracy is being held here against the will of patients as are treated the same way by Nazi groups in the 1940s. As experiements.
You can see an appearance of Max Von Sydow playing a very secretive doctor, an actor best known as the priest in the ultra horror film “The Exorcist.” Even Ben Kingsley, who plays the head shrink in the facility, glitters with glaring menace every time he sneers, like a man hiding his thoughts.
It’s nice to see how the film twists and turns into something unexpected and it is more of a journey for the lead character who learns about something in himself. There is no place for him to run at the end of the film. And he is faced with the greatest monster: himself. The film is directed with a pivoting sharpness that drags you along through a maze of darkness.
It can be argued that the film is strictly a psychological thriller which would probably result in more viewers coming to see the film in theaters. However, the gothic type of settings along with the lead character growing more aware of his losing sanity is very much worthy of H.P. Lovecraft, whose stories always ended with an anti-climax of characters doubting themselves. And often shuddering at the insignificance of the universe around them. Calling “Shutter Island” a horror film shouldn’t be an insult. Calling it a horror film, however, would most likely bring cat calls from other critics. That's too bad.
There’s a very interesting last line Daniels makes at the end of the film: he asks whether it is better to "live as a monster, or die as a good man.” And it’s a very powerful scene. I didn’t even mind DeCapio in this film as he is trying his best to make a good performance under the directorial skill of Scorsese. I rank him along with Brad Pitt as actors who do at least try to confront very challenging roles.
But why would anyone be ashamed of calling it a horror film? It’s a perfectly good one that knows how to build tension since there's a good director adding some respectability to the genre. It’s an underrated film at best. Horror fans shouldn’t pass up a good treat as they will be given an excellent story filled with fantastic images that would make you shiver.
posted by K.M. Paters at 11:12 AM
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