It turns out Martin Scorsese’s new thriller is a salute to the master of suspense himself: Alfred Hitchcock. Opening today, the movie Shutter Island is Scorsese’s latest film. Starring Leonardo DiCaprio (this is their 4th reunion), the movie centers around a mysterious and disturbing insane asylum and the two cops sent there to investigate a particular inmate who has managed to escape. But strange things begin to unfold about the watchmen of the Island itself!
Little did I know, Scorsese is a member of a non-profit organization called The Film Foundation, which fights to preserve the integrity of old, black and white films, and which has brought to the attention of critics the memory of forgotten directors, and has also restored numerous forgotten gems from the early 20th century. For instance, at one point, they tried to fight against making black and white films colored for modern audiences, but to no avail.
The Hitchcock films Scorsese has restored are Saboteur, Shadow of a Doubt and Suspicion. What is interesting is that all these movies begin with the letter S. Now, when Scorsese makes a movie dripping with Hitchcock stylistic themes, he makes Shutter Island, beginning with the letter S!
Shutter Island is adapted from the book by Dennis Lehane, released 1954. What else came out in 1954?: Dial M for Murder and Rear Window! - Hitchcock classics.
Another factor here is that a couple years ago Scorsese worked with a Spanish movie producer to shoot a short film during which he found 3 missing pages from a Hitchcock script that had been lost up till then!
In Shutter Island, we have - among other scenes - a shower scene (Psycho), a scene where people are hurrying up a tall building (Vertigo), and a hurrying up a rocky crag scene (North By Northwest), intentionally put in as a tribute to the master.
Matt Damore
Showing posts with label Hitchcock. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Hitchcock. Show all posts
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
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