Shutter Island

It plays better than it reviews — the watch lands harder than the write-ups suggest.

• “When was the last time you had to wait until the final sentence of a film to understand all the details? When was the last time you went to a genre movie – or what looked like one in spooky trailers – and realized the director had fulfilled that promise and meditated on his favorite topic? Shutter Island does just that.”

  Lawrence Toppman, Charlotte Observer · 100

• “There’s a purpose to all this madness--though to talk about the primary reason the film succeeds would be giving the game away--but it should be appreciated first as a vivid, waking nightmare.”

  Scott Tobias, The A.V. Club · 91

• “Martin Scorsese has created a divinely dark and devious brain tease of a movie in the best noir tradition with its smarter than you'd think cops, their tougher than you'd imagine cases to crack and enough nods to the classic genre for an all-night parlor game.”

  Betsy Sharkey, Los Angeles Times · 90

• “Not since "Raging Bull" has Mr. Scorsese so brazenly married brutality to beauty. Not since "Kundun" has one of his films felt so aspirational.”

  John Anderson, Wall Street Journal · 90

• “DiCaprio, in his most haunting and emotionally complex performance yet, is the vessel Scorsese uses to lead us through the film’s laby­rinth.”

  Peter Travers, Rolling Stone · 88