History Headscratchers / ShutterIsland

*** In the book, she's the youngest. When Andrew comes home and asks where the children are and Dolores tells him that they're at school, in the book he points out that Rachel's too young to go to school.

** Whew, I saw that second one and thought '''I''' was crazy. Probably, it was a subtle audience clue. Since there's no Chuck, there's no glass of water. Or perhaps it is a side effect of her craziness -- she doesn't actually pick up the glass, because she's loony. Maybe she thinks, like Noyce does, that there's SomethingInTheWater. As for the first one, that was during a dream; there was a lot more going on there that was weird than just a disappearing bottle. As in most of his dreams.

** A lot of real world last names sound fake or weird. It's not as unnatural to come across someone with a strange last name than you think.

* Okay, so the doctors [[spoiler: decided it would be a good idea to give Andrew, who is stated to be one of their most dangerous patients, free-reign of the asylum in order to act out his destructive fantasy in the hopes that it would bring him back to reality, when it could have easily resulted in him either getting himself or many other people killed in the process.]] Does anyone else fail to see the logic here?

** And let's not forget that the thing actually ''works''. Teddy [[spoiler: realises who he really is because of the simulation]].
** And he's not a 'dangerous' patient in the sense that he's likely to start attacking people. [[spoiler: He's delusional that he's still a US Marshall - and doesn't seem prone to bursts of violence. The roleplay had his psychiatrist by his side most of the time, who would presumably call an end to it if other people's safety was at stake. Burning Dr Cawley's car seems to have been an unexpected variable.]]
** Then what was the objective behind [[spoiler: the gaslighting? Dr. Cawley's attempts to convince Andrew that he'd never had a partner, when he'd been working with "Chuck" the whole time, clearly made him more unstable and did not help his epiphany come any more smoothly.]]

** They may have simply made it up, in-universe. Since [[spoiler:Andrew is one of their most dangerous patients]] they would obviously not want him to have a firearm.[[spoiler: As for why they apparently gave him a gun to begin with if they were just going to take it away, it could be a risk they took to further cement his delusion of being a U.S. marshal since they would probably have a standard-issue firearm.]] And as for why he doesn't know that the statute is fake, well, you could chalk that up to simple ignorance on his part.
*** The gun [[spoiler:is fake anyway]], as we see at the end. But perhaps they take it away because if he had used it, [[spoiler:or, say, sat on it, the kayfabe would disintegrate along with it]]. As for the statute, you'd think a ''federal'' Marshal would know about ''federal'' penitentiary law before setting foot on the island. Seeing as how the Marshals are tasked with retrieving escapees, federal penitentiaries would be common territory.

** Whew, I saw that second one and thought '''I''' was crazy. Probably, it was [[spoiler:a subtle audience clue. Since there's no Chuck, there's no glass of water]]. Or perhaps it is a side effect of her craziness -- she doesn't actually pick up the glass, because she's loony. Maybe she thinks, like Noyce does, that there's SomethingInTheWater. As for the first one, that was during a dream; there was a lot more going on there that was weird than just a disappearing bottle. As in most of his dreams.
** To add another reason: We're seeing the movie from the protagonist's, [[spoiler:Andrew's]], point of view. At this point in the movie (as well as other points in the movie), we are seeing [[spoiler:Teddy's true self seep through the surface of his alias. As a troubled patient at the mental hospital, Andrew Laeddis has a severe aversion to water. (It is a wonder if the harsh weather in the movie strengthened his psychosis and hindered the doctor's experiment in any way.) It is a sensible fear because his wife drowned his three children in a lake by their house. He swam into the lake in order to pull their cold, dead bodies from the water. His wife was soaking wet when she approached him with the crazy idea of [[MummiesattheDinnerTable dressing them up as dolls and going on a picnic.]] He blames himself for her mental deterioration and by extension, the dead kids. To Andrew Laeddis, water only brings pain and guilt.]] He does not want to face the harsh reality of what water means to him so his mind mentally blocks its existence. Notice you only see the glass of water of the patient he is interviewing when it is empty.
** The books reveals in its opening chapter that Teddy's father was a sailor who drowned at sea, and that even before then, he always felt uncomfortable around the sea. It's never really confirmed if [[spoiler:this holds true for Andrew Laeddis as well, though it is stated that his father really did die very early. It's altogether possible that Andrew's unintentionally rationalizing his obvious hydrophobia with childhood trauma, instead of facing what happened much later in his life.]]
* Why is Andrew in a mental hospital? Or for that matter, a federal prison? Seems to me that what he did was a crime of passion, Murder 2 at most, not a case of criminal insanity. What did he do that made him a danger to others? Are other [[spoiler:wives of his likely going to kill their children also]], therefore he must be stopped before he kills again?

* In what scenes with Chuck [[spoiler: is he really there]]? In the beginning, Teddy and Chuck are on the ferry to the island, chit-chatting. So, did [[spoiler: they]] really [[spoiler: take him out on the ferry, and then turn it around just so that]] he and Chuck come off the ferry?
** [[spoiler:Chuck is always there, except in Teddy's dreams and in that moment when he hallucinates Chuck's body at the bottom of the cliff; it's just that "Chuck" is Sheehan playing a role. And yes, they really did take them out on the ferry just to help Teddy pretend that he was arriving for the first time.]]
* Why does Dr. Sheehan [[spoiler: play along with]] Laeddis' delusion? Even in the lighthouse scene, he still calls Laeddis [[spoiler: "Boss"]].

** [[spoiler:The book's prologue is written by Dr. Sheehan, who states he considered Teddy Daniels a dear friend. Also, it's important to note that in the lighthouse scene, Sheehan isn't pretending, just being affectionate with his patient of two years.]]

* This is more about a weird writing decision than the plot itself. It feels a little too convenient that [[spoiler:the character's real name]] "Andrew Laeddis", a very weird-sounding name, just happens to work out as an anagram of [[spoiler:the fake persona's name]] "Edward Daniels". I would think that having [[spoiler:"Daniels" be the real name and "Laeddis" the fake name]] would be more natural.

** And it seems less likely for [[spoiler: "Laeddis"]] which ''is'' the more unusual name, to have been made up by [[spoiler: Laeddis]].
** Also, [[spoiler:Andrew has had quite some time to develop this delusion. He could have been messing around with the letters of his name at some point in order to create a new one.]]
** Actually, this is addressed in the book. [[spoiler:Andrew's sons were named Edward and Daniel. 'Edward Daniels' and 'Rachel Solando' are both in fact references to Andrew's dead children. Also, Teddy was in fact a codebreaker during the war, so the book is littered with loads of anagrams and riddles, which they cut out of the screenplay because a lot of it only really works if you're reading a book and can dwell on the puzzles. The sons are also renamed Simon and Henry, because A) It's incredibly unrealistic Andrew would name his sons in preparation for oneday assuming an anagram-friendly amalgam of their names, and B) Saying 'Remember your sons! Edward! Daniel!' aloud would confuse audience members, ('Remember your sons, Edward Daniels?') because again, a lot of the twists only work if you have time to absorb them. The only issue in the final film is that one gets the impression Andrew didn't really care for his sons compared to his daughter Rachel, when in fact he was just as much in mourning for them. (Though admittedly, there's a paragraph that mentions he did love Dolores more than his sons, but perhaps not his daughter.)]]

*** In the book, she's the youngest. [[spoiler: When Andrew comes home and asks where the children are and Dolores tells him that they're at school, in the book he points out that Rachel's too young to go to school.]]

** Been a while since I watched the film, but was Rachel the youngest? YoungestChildWins and all that.

** Then what was the objective behind the gaslighting? Dr. Cawley's attempts to convince Andrew that he'd never had a partner, when he'd been working with "Chuck" the whole time, clearly made him more unstable and did not help his epiphany come any more smoothly.