Analysing a Film's Opening Scene (Shutter Island)

In the opening scene for Shutter Island we seen the main characters on a boat, supposedly travelling across water to an ‘island’. We immediately see Leonardo Di Caprio’s character being sick inside a very dimly let and frankly dirty restroom. We see from his costume that he is a man of authority, his belt holding a police badge and a gun. From this we can deduce he is a detective as he has the shield awarded to people in that line of work. He is speaking to himself about his worry about being on the water. Then he looks into the mirror, his face showing extreme hints towards emotions of fear, stress and rage. The character is represented as somewhat weak, he cannot handle being on the sea, but also full of pent up emotion that could be set free at any point. His facial expressions allow the audience to feel a sense of mystery towards this character, as we do not yet know what he is truly scared of or angry about. This allows us to identify the genre of this film, thriller. The character then proceeds to leave the restroom and walk out onto the deck of the boat, where someone else waits. As he is walking through the boat we can see handcuffs hanging from the ceiling. This usage of props could reflect the characters feeling of entrapment on the boat but could also have been used to back up the idea that he is a policeman.

As he walks out of the boat we can see just how melancholy this scene is, the low key lighting along with a flat surrounding scene represents a sense of sadness and loneliness. We are introduced to the supporting character, played by Mark Ruffalo, who states that the man we saw throwing up is actually his boss. This revelation provides a stark contrast in social status as Leonardo Di Caprio’s character seems a lot weaker and more damaged than that of Mark Ruffalo’s, however their standing in society is opposite to this. There is an abundance of camera angle switches and changes between different shots whilst the two characters are having dialogue. Close-ups on each of the character’s faces shows the difference between their current physical appearance, along with their moral state. Mark Ruffalo’s character is a lot calmer and more collected than his boss, whilst Di Caprio’s character looks extremely ill. As an audience this tells us a lot about the contrast between the two characters.

The scene then proceeds with a flashback, showing who seems to be Di Caprio’s wife. The lighting in this scene is high key and the colour is almost golden, reflecting the immense happiness that both of these characters must be feeling. When compared to the scene on the boat, we as an audience can tell that this happy life is soon to come to a close, as everything is so much darker in the present day. However, the scene with his wife presents us with a feeling of joy and happiness for these two characters, but also an intrigue as to what happened. Finally, the shot quickly pans back to the water from the boat, this shot being cut apart by a still image of the wife, as though that is Di Caprio’s final memory of her and that is being cut away by the events of the present day. This is symbolic of the fact that the past cannot be perfect for longer than a moment.