Shutter Island (2/5)
Posted on 12 Mar 2010
Scorcese makes a brown smoothie out of every dramatic sub-genre he hasn’t mastered yet, and things fall apart to comic affect. This is M. Night kitsch with a ton of brilliant actors stumbling around some truly menacing, beautiful sets in what turns out to be–spoiler–“the most elaborate role play ever!”, so says Ben Kingsley. I would have giggled out loud at that point if the film had any levity in its soul. My diagnosis by the last reel was “bereaved”. I’m perfectly fine accepting the occasional dream, psychotic episode, first person switcheroo, con heist flips (see The Brothers Bloom), or Emilio waking up in the bathtub at the end, but when a whole film hinges around a rather underwhelming and emotionally limp fantasy, the viewer is going to leave grumpy. We’re already attempting to invest in a fictional story, and now you want us to invest in a fake fictional story. Egads! Go rent the trailer instead; all the grit and suspense in under three minutes. He’s only like the next Martin Scorceeze!
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