Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: Shutter Island

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Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 02-20-2010, 10:21 PM:

WOW! Absolutly amazing piece of film work. I will see it again tomrrow. Incredible acting, casting, script, camera work, effects, and precise editing all contribute to this extremely creepy masterpiece!

Posted by Brad Miller (Member # 2) on 02-20-2010, 10:45 PM:

Please allow me to rephrase.

Reels 1-6 are very good.

Reels 7-8 suddenly try to make it something bigger than it needs to be to be effective and ends up failing in a predictable M. Night sort of way.

Posted by Joe Redifer (Member # 3) on 02-21-2010, 10:15 AM:

I hear that nobody likes the ending.

Posted by Dan Lyons (Member # 1454) on 02-21-2010, 11:12 AM:

I also loved the first six reels. Very much like a good Hitchcock film. The rest... [uhoh]

Posted by Joe Elliott (Member # 4006) on 02-21-2010, 01:23 PM:

I figured out the ending in the first 15 minutes, and just kept hoping they would throw in some curves. Although very linear in plot, it was still moderately ok in my book. Good script, acting and filmwork kept it from being horrible. And thank god no shaky cam footage.

Posted by Mark Lensenmayer (Member # 134) on 02-22-2010, 05:18 PM:

I'm with Mark G. on this one. This film has no dragging spots, has some outstanding acting, and pays homage to Hitchcock in some interesting ways. We really enjoyed this one!

As always, music is an important part of this film, as it is with most Scorsese projects. Much of the music was classical music composed at about the era of the story.

I wish I could have heard ALL of the music, because the right channel sound in room 24 of the AMC LENNOX 24 was either very low or non-existent. Is this film very active in the surrounds? I heard none at this screening, and Scorsese usually puts lots of music in the surround tracks.

There are a couple of scenes in the film I would like to see again knowing the ending. <non-spoiler here> The dialogue with the prisoner in cellblock C could be very interesting in retrospect.

This one gets an A.

Posted by Chris Slycord (Member # 4239) on 02-22-2010, 11:08 PM:

quote: Mark Lensenmayer
I wish I could have heard ALL of the music, because the right channel sound in room 24 of the AMC LENNOX 24 was either very low or non-existent. Is this film very active in the surrounds? I heard none at this screening, and Scorsese usually puts lots of music in the surround tracks.

Quite a few AMCs (at least ones that weren't obtained through mergers with other chains) have SDDS only for surround sound and run stereo as the backup. But I know nothing of that theater in particular, and when I watched it, I could hear the surrounds quite well.

Posted by Mark Lensenmayer (Member # 134) on 02-23-2010, 12:02 PM:

This was in one of the 4-central, big rooms with multiple digital sound systems. Sounds like things were just messed up for that screening. There was also some weirdness with the pre-show projector. Looks to me like someone at AMC LENNOX 24 just wasn't paying attention. I reported the problem, but got a blank stare from the customer relations desk.

Still, Shutter Island is a good movie and I did enjoy it.

Posted by Scott Norwood (Member # 30) on 02-24-2010, 12:19 PM:

I was disappointed with the film. It's a good B-movie script, and the performances and direction are not horrible, but I expected much more from Scorsese. I didn't even find it to be particularly entertaining, for the most part.

Still, it is one of the best current films that I have seen in months, which is sad.

Posted by Mike Croaro (Member # 3123) on 02-26-2010, 12:01 PM:

Hi Folks:

Saw this yesterday. I enjoyed it but Brad hit the nail on the head. The first 3/4 are very good and the last part was dissapointing.

Mike

Posted by Jim Cassedy (Member # 4115) on 02-27-2010, 09:19 AM:

I stayed and watched on opening day after my shift.

I bascially enjoyed it, but I was distracted by the
fact that reel 2 had a small hair in the printer
gate dancing around at the top right of the screen
for the 2nd half of the reel, and part of the
cyan sound track was bleeding into the left edge
of the picture for all of reel 3 on my print.

Posted by Claude S. Ayakawa (Member # 1401) on 03-01-2010, 12:13 PM:

I saw SHUTTER ISLAND at Regal's Pearl Highland yesterday afternoon and enjoyed the film very much. As mentioned, the classical music pieces made the movie more interesting and entertaining. Beside the music of Gustav Mahler, the film featured a lot of music by Gyorgy Ligeti whose music was also used in Stanley Kubrick's 2001 A SPACE ODYSSEY. The photography was drab looking and set the mood for the movie. All of the performance by the cast was very good. I thought the entire movie was good. The only complaint I had with the movie as well as many 35mm film presentations I had seen since I got Blu Ray and a 1080p HD television was the picture quality in the theatres was not as vibrant as I have become accustomed to seeing at home in HD. This was mentioned in another thread I had posted in the Afterlife forum.

-Claude

Posted by Jonathan Smith (Member # 5609) on 03-01-2010, 12:22 PM:

I was SO DISAPPOINTED that a Scope movie could look so soft.

The "flashback scenes" for DiCaprio's wartime past (without spoiling it) were supposedly shot, in part, on 65mm 5-perf. film. Couldn't tell with such a shoddy 2K DI.

These things ought to be BANNED on 4-perf. scope/5-perf. 65mm films. Image quality has taken such a nose-dive in the last decade (if you don't believe me run a "Thin Red Line" trailer immediately followed by "Shutter Island") that it makes me sick.

Digital is going to replace film because the studios have INTENTIONALLY made 35mm prints look like [bs]

This movie is worse than the DI work I saw on Indy IV.

At the same time, I liked the story, even though the whole film looked like it was shot out of focus. It wasn't perfect, and I agree that it kinda died after the end of reel 6, but I'd give it maybe a B- at worst.

No "One Flew Over the Cookoo's Nest" but easily the best work in this genre in a long time. Most "psycho dramas" fail miserably; I like this much better than "Gangs of New York" or any of the hundreds of TV shows I've seen that try, unsuccessfully, to deal with this subject.

Posted by Joe Elliott (Member # 4006) on 03-02-2010, 02:44 PM:

I do agree with you, I think the film companies are watering down the 35mm copies, to force us to digital. I have never seen such poor quality as the prints that have been coming out since about mid summer 2009. Bad focus, bad color, extreme film grain. Their digital equivalents look great, so it is all added in during print production. If they aren't adding it in on purpose, they are doing a piss poor job during the printing process. It would be interesting to hear someones take on this from one of the labs.

Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 03-02-2010, 05:54 PM:

Actually the print I saw looked very sharp and had superb blacks. If you read my review you'll see that I was amazed they cold get Eastman to do the black ranges it did for this film.

Mark

Posted by John Koutsoumis (Member # 1855) on 03-03-2010, 12:13 AM:

In the print that I am screening the surreal sequences look amazing with good blacks, depth and colour. But yes the rest of the film has softer look to it but not on all shots.

Posted by Joe Elliott (Member # 4006) on 03-03-2010, 09:10 AM:

Well, then it may be my second hypothesis, some of the labs are doing a piss poor job of printing them. I will have to write down which lab ours came from, when I go in tonight.

Posted by Matt Gress (Member # 5377) on 03-03-2010, 08:43 PM:

Our print has the same hair in the printer gate Jim Cassidy saw plus some bad color problems at the beginning of reel 2. Plus it wasn't new - some goofball had removed the trailer at the beginning and spliced it on backwards. Yup.

Posted by Joe Elliott (Member # 4006) on 03-05-2010, 08:59 PM:

Are you sure that wasn't done at the lab? Ours was spliced on out of frame, and it was a new print.

And yes, I forgot to grab the info on what lab our print came from.

Posted by Chris Slycord (Member # 4239) on 03-05-2010, 11:08 PM:

quote: Joe Elliott
Are you sure that wasn't done at the lab? Ours was spliced on out of frame, and it was a new print.

If it was spliced with regular splicing tape rather than with an ultrasonic, then it probably wasn't done at the lab and instead was at the film depot (and the depots are notorious for getting people who almost always splice trailers poorly).

Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 03-07-2010, 05:34 PM:

Saw this again all the way through again today... in digital at Gatwway #3... image was too dark... thank you digital! The film presentation I saw previously in Ketchum, ID was far superior.

I enjoyed it even better the second time and took note more of the music used... I find it utterly amazing that some did not get the ending...

Mark

Posted by John Wilson (Member # 269) on 03-07-2010, 07:38 PM:

quote:
Saw this again all the way through again today... in digital at Gatwway #3... image was too dark... thank you digital!

OK, what have you done with Mark?

Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 03-07-2010, 09:25 PM:

Nooooope... I'm not responsible for that theater... or it's measley snack bar.

Mark

Posted by John Wilson (Member # 269) on 03-07-2010, 09:32 PM:

There is no 'it' in my previous post.

I was referring to your sudden reversal from 'Digital is the second coming' to 'Digital sucks'. What happened?

Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 03-07-2010, 09:43 PM:

No, In this case the film presentation I saw... at a theater I happen to maintain... looked and sounded far superior to it's digital counterpart at a mainstream theater.

I still like digital and service a number of digital booths but I am a lot less pro digital these days just because of the forth comming new generation of projectors. Christie in particuluar has been very very slow at dealing with some very serious software bugs in the past. I am advising everyone to go sit on the fence post for at least another year and let some one else ring out the problems that always seem to exist. My customers are way too far apart to deal with that sort of nonsense. Lets face it... the longer we can all sit this out the more likely the studios might be prodded into direct VPFs or at least some other deal in which the indies don't get shafted quite as bad as they will be from the current CBG deal.

Mark

Posted by Jim Cassedy (Member # 4115) on 03-07-2010, 09:48 PM:

quote: Matt Gress
Our print has the same hair in the printer gate Jim Cassidy saw

Actually, we sort of "solved" that problem by swapping that
print with one that was playing at another theater also
run by my boss. The 2nd theater has a slightly undersize
aperature plate, which was just enough to hide-the-hair.

But even at that location, you can still see the cyan
sound track bleed on Reel 3. I'll have to look & see
what lab it came from.

Posted by Chad Souder (Member # 343) on 03-12-2010, 08:51 PM:

This movie was far below what I've come to expect from Scorsese. It was predictable and

Spoiler Alert - Click to Toggle
It is unfair to the audience to have so much that later gets explained as "hallucinations." The beauty of a great twist movie like Sixth Sense is that when you go back and watch it again, you see the subtle hints were there all along. In Shutter Island, a whole scene takes place of a conversation in a cave with the escaped woman and then later you find out it never really happened and he just imagined it all. He also imagined seeing his dead partner at the bottom of the rocks. Well that's just silly.

I was pretty disappointed, but I did pick up on one interesting thing. Leo was originally considered for the role of Hans Landa in Tarantino's Inglourious Basterds but was passed over when Tarantino decided he wanted a german speaking actor to play the role. In Shutter Island, Leo speaks seemingly fluent german in a scene. Coincidence?

Posted by Richard P. May (Member # 3598) on 03-13-2010, 10:26 AM:

I saw the picture a couple of days ago at the AMC Century City in Los Angeles.
The presentation was just fine. Good picture and proper sound levels. Film presentation. I didn't notice any of the problems noted by previous posters, but was enough engrossed by the picture that I wasn't looking for anything unless it really jumped out.
Announced starting time was 3:30pm. After seven trailers the feature finally got on at 3:30.

DM

Posted by Chris Slycord (Member # 4239) on 03-13-2010, 02:30 PM:

quote: Richard P. May
Announced starting time was 3:30pm. After seven trailers the feature finally got on at 3:30.

7 trailers in 0 minutes? Amazing! [Razz]

Posted by Sam Graham (Member # 2889) on 03-13-2010, 10:14 PM:

CINEMA: Mall of America 14, Bloomington, MN
AUDITORIUM: 1
PRESENTATION: 35mm/Mystery Meat Crapophonic 3-Channel Non-Surround
PRESENTATION PROBLEMS: There are drive-ins with better sound
RATING: 2 1/2 stars (out of four)

This 20-year old GCC build of Mall-3-like auditoriums is now apparently being run by the mall management after AMC walked away. The last time I was here (Mortal Kombat), the seats were small and leg room was cramped. That got upgraded, as did the snack bar (they have booze). Presentation...could use some help.

THE PLOT: A disappearance is investigated. Wackiness ensues.

I might have liked this better if I hadn't seen this so many times in the past eleven years. It was pretty easy to figure this out early on. I did actually like the ending...the very ending...though.

But I expect more from Scorsese.

Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 03-13-2010, 10:56 PM:

Is there actually a part in this movie where someone gets stabbed in the neck with a meat thermometer? Or perhaps a fountain pen? Any stabbings at all. Or is that only perpetrated be cellular phone using assholes in the audience?

Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 03-13-2010, 11:14 PM:

Bobby, This is more along the lines of a Hitchcock movie... if someone did get stabbed you wouldn't actually see it happen.

Posted by Ian Parfrey (Member # 5122) on 03-14-2010, 12:50 AM:

Wow! So many questions raised here...

..like how did the stabbing be allowed to happen?

..didn't anyone see this happen?

..what are the operators doing about it?

..and was it cooked properly?

Posted by Tony Gallimore (Member # 5358) on 03-17-2010, 10:24 PM:

Like many other's reviews, I was fine for the first 2/3rds, but I got really restless as the later third began to drag. I sought out a 35mm version, which was excellent (I'm still not too fond of digital, like 3d glasses, it gives me a headache)... the tragedy was with the story line. Leo did a pretty good job in spite of the weak script.

Posted by Jonathan Goeldner (Member # 4854) on 04-19-2010, 08:36 PM:

I enjoyed this movie, but the theatre I saw this at hampered the experience, given the number of dark scenes, Regal Bethesda has the WORST exit signs to the right and left of the screen that are SOOOOO bright, you'd think they were there for the visually imparied, needless to say, my eyes kept on wandering off the screen, I so wanted to take a hammer and smash the exit signs. It also didn't help that the film was not being decoded in 5.1 digital sound, the soundmix as a result came across as lifeless and undramatic - will more than likely rent the bluray to hear and see this movie properly.