There are movies that immediately come to mind when you hear the word twist: “Fight Club,” “The Usual Suspects,” or much of M. Night Shyamalan’s filmography. But “Shutter Island” is definitely one of them – if you’ve seen it. If not, you can still do this easily via Amazon, but you have to be quick: “Shutter Island” is only included in your Amazon Prime Video subscription until January 19, 2024. After that, Prime subscribers will also have to use their wallets to watch the stream.
But before we get into (spoiler-free) what makes the twist in the 2010 mystery thriller so legendary, here’s the plot for you:
That’s what “Shutter Island” is about
U.S. Marshal Teddy Daniels (Leonardo DiCaprio) and his colleague Chuck Aule (Mark Ruffalo) are sent to Shutter Island, an island blown by gale-force winds and home to an asylum for mentally disturbed violent criminals. Teddy and Chuck must find out what happened to missing Patient 67 (Emily Mortimer).
But that is not so easy, since the staff of the institution, especially the head doctor Dr. Cawley (Ben Kingsley) is uncooperative. During the investigation, the research duo encounters more and more inconsistencies that raise terrible suspicions…
That’s why “Shutter Island” and its twist are so great
First of all, even without a twist, “Shutter Island” would work as a gripping psychological thriller. Because under the direction of Martin Scorsese (“Taxi Driver”), the film impresses on all levels of craftsmanship. Leonardo DiCaprio delivers his usual intense, complex performance; in Ben Kingsley he has an equally opaque opponent, but the even bigger star is the setting.
The terrible weather, the confident images of three-time Oscar-winning cinematographer Robert Richardson and the institution’s many strangely behaving inmates (and employees) condense the atmosphere of this prison, surrounded by stormy waves, so that it is easy to imagine yourself in prison places. Teddy’s shoes, who ends up as an outsider in this inhospitable environment.
The fact that there is a twist is the icing on the cake that takes ‘Shutter Island’ from a good to an excellent film in my opinion. Of course we don’t want to reveal the surprising twist here, but… It’s this kind of twist that makes you look at the whole event with different eyes and makes you want to watch the thriller again – which is absolutely worth it. Because the twist easily survives a second viewing and sharpens your attention to countless details you didn’t even notice the first time. But what makes it even more exciting is a clever little change from the original book.
While Dennis Lehane’s novel ‘Shutter Island’ provides a very clear resolution of the events, director maestro Scorsese deliberately leaves the ending vague, so that you almost have to see the film a second time to form your own opinion about the two possible ones. scenarios is actually the correct one.
“Shutter Island” is a film that will keep you glued to the screen for over two hours and will keep you entertained for a while even after the credits. So you shouldn’t miss the Scorsese thriller.