Scorsese's THE SHINING?

By Matt Holmes / February 14, 2010

Todd McCarthy has posted a love letter of a review to Martin Scorsese's psychological thriller Shutter Island which opens in the U.S. next Friday (sadly.. 12.03.10 in U.K.), and he gives it a solid "A" grade...

Expert, screw-turning narrative filmmaking put at the service of old-dark-madhouse claptrap, "Shutter Island" arguably occupies a similar place in Martin Scorsese's filmography as "The Shining" does in Stanley Kubrick's.

Scorsese's The Shining? Has he really knocked it far out of the ball park, and delivered a late in the career masterpiece? Ever since the full length trailer was released in June, I was expecting a Wicker Man style, Sam Raimi B-Movie that recalled the low-budget horror yarns of 40s Hollywood yesteryear, especially the works of Val Lewton and Jacques Tourneur, with a bit of 50s classic film noir and Scorsese's own Cape Fear thrown in for good measure. But McCarthy says The Shining... the pinnacle of the genre, and the pinnacle of one of the greatest ever's filmography. This is exciting...

In his first dramatic feature since "The Departed," Scorsese applies his protean skill and unsurpassed knowledge of Hollywood genres to create a dark, intense thriller involving insanity, ghastly memories, mind-alteration and violence, all wrapped in a story about the search for a missing patient at an island asylum.