Sunday, December 27, 2009

Scorsese’s Shutter Island is Now Ashecliffe


For some reason, the Powers That Be have decided to change the title of Martin Scorsese and Leonardo DiCaprio’s thriller, “Shutter Island” to … “Ashecliffe”, the name of a mental facility in the movie where much of the film supposedly takes place. “Ashecliffe” has Dicaprio, re-teaming with Scorsese for the fourth time, playing a U.S. Marshall investigating the escape of a murderess who is presumed to be hiding on Shutter Island.

“Ashecliffe” is based on the novel “Shutter Island” by Dennis Lehane (“Gone Baby Gone”, “Mystic River”).
More about the novel from its book jacket:

In summer 1954, two U.S. marshals, protagonist Teddy Daniels and his new partner, Chuck Aule, arrive on Shutter Island, not far from Boston, to investigate the disappearance of patient Rachel Solando from the prison/hospital for the criminally insane that dominates the island. The marshals’ digging gets them nowhere fast as they learn of Rachel’s apparently miraculous escape past locked doors and myriad guards, and as they encounter roadblocks and lies strewn across their path-most notably by the hospital’s chief physician, the enigmatic J. Cawley-and pick up hints of illegal brain surgery performed at the hospital. Then, as a major hurricane bears down on the island, inciting a riot among the insane and cutting off all access to the mainland, they begin to fear for their lives. All of the characters-particularly Teddy, haunted by the tragic death of his wife-are wonderful creations, but no more wonderful than the spot-on dialogue with which Lehane brings them to life and the marvelous prose that enriches the narrative. There are mysteries within mysteries in this novel, some as obvious as the numerical codes that the missing patient leaves behind and which Teddy, a code breaker in WWII, must solve; some as deep as the most profound fears of the human heart
This thing sounds intense.

Scorsese’s Shutter Island is Now Ashecliffe

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