Did you see it coming?
2010 was a tough year for Leonardo DiCaprio, at least onscreen anyway.
Months before the actor pulled off daring dream-within-a-dream heists in Inception, he got his hands dirty in Martin Scorsese’s excellent Shutter Island, playing a detective out of his depth as the walls slowly close in.
There’s a couple of notable parallels between the Dennis Lehane adaptation and Christopher Nolan’s thoughtful blockbuster, chief of which is that Leo is arguably playing the same character – a brilliant but troubled man desperate to get back to his family.
Granted, that summary does somewhat undercut the tension and dread that’s on display throughout Shutter Island.
If you’re unfamiliar, the action centres on DiCaprio’s stressed out U.S. Marshall Teddy Daniels and his partner Chuck Aule (Mark Ruffalo) as the pair investigate a remote psychiatric facility following the disappearance of one of its patients.
As you might expect, nothing is what it seems. Or is it?
Clip via YouTube Movies
Now, you can probably guess from the above trailer what’s really going on but the genius of Shutter Island is the journey, not the destination.
In that regard, it’s really quite an underrated gem as Martin Scorsese expertly plays with genre tropes to create a genuinely unsettling thriller that stays with you long after the credits roll.
DiCaprio is at his best, with a tremendous supporting cast that includes Ben Kingsley, Michelle Williams, Max Von Sydow, Jackie Earle Haley, Emily Mortimer and a brief but terrifying turn from Ted Levine of The Silence of the Lambs fame.
What’s more, Shutter Island is one of those great films that practically demands a second viewing, as you’ll pick up on a rake of clever little details that you missed out first time even if you thought you had it all figured out.
Shutter Island is on Film 4 at 01:20am on Saturday May 5
