Shutter Island: Not vintage Scorsese, but brilliant.

I went to see "Shutter Island" with a friend who has read the book that the film was based on. She had to read the book four times to completely understand the story and the twists and turns. But for the film version, Martin Scorsese does not have the luxury of having his audiences watch the film four times to understand the story, and so he played out the script in a crystal-clear manner, and the audience was probably satisfied by the end of the film.

The acting was terrific throughout the cast. Leonardo DiCaprio was perfect cast as the lead and he really dove into this role. Without giving anything away, I'll just say this role is somewhat similar to his role in "The Departed", only perhaps even edgier.

I was also impressed by the supporting cast, perhaps even more so than by Leo's performance. Ben Kingsley and Max von Sydow make effective cunning figures, sending chills down our spines with their lines. Mark Ruffalo gives a quietly great performance as Leo's partner in the film.

The one thing I had a slight issue with was the casting of Jackie Earle Haley; the three films he's most famous for, he's played: a pedophile ("Little Children"), a conspiracy-theorist Superhero (Rorschach in "Watchmen"), and now as an insane prisoner in "Shutter Island". Haley seemed perfect for the role, but perhaps the makers could have taken a risk and cast someone we don't already associate with insanity.

What can be said about the film making itself? My first impression was that it was done very well, in a by-the-book kind of way. The editing is well paced so that we can see what is going on (and the acting too), but it's not anything we haven't seen before.

Finally, though, the film, as well as the book, (I assume) is a study into the idea of insanity. At one point late in the movie, there is a brief discussion on the issue of institutionalized insanity. The story of the movie takes place in the mid 1950s. About a decade after that, French post-structuralist philosopher Michel Foucault write a series of literature (the Order of Things, Discipline & Punish, a History of Madness) discussing insanity. What is it? how is it defined? The nature of insanity itself is a controversial category, and many of us take for granted the loose definitions provided by the definers.

"Shutter Island" is a terrific film, but it certainly felt like Scorsese was not going for the best film of his career. That's quite okay; I'll take decent Scorsese over Michael Bay any day.