Analysis and Things You May Not Have Noticed In Shutter Island

The beginning of the movie is a little unclear to me and if anyone can help clear this up that would be great. He has made a breakthrough to reality once before but regressed. When that was is not clear in the film, and hence, it is not clear to me how the movie starts with him on the boat and having no recollection of previous experiences of the institution or how he got on the boat to begin with.... Moving on… 

He gets sea sick because his children were drowned and large bodies of water serve as an unconscious reminder, causing his sea sickness.Our introduction of Teddy is on the ship in the beginning. We also see a flashback. There is a woman, presumably his wife and we see a montage of her putting his tie on and a shot of an old record player, which has a recurring appearance in the film. Perhaps it was the music that was playing when he arrived home right before the trauma?

First clue something isn't right, but not a clue into the true story that is happening.

"You boys look a little on edge."

"Right now, Marshal, we all are."

I didn't catch this at first, but Teddy knows that the institution has an electrified perimeter. He appears to deduce that from his knowledge as a U.S. Marshal, but there is another reason. Teddy makes this observation because he has been at the Institution for two years. However, his alternate personality has not, but because separate personalities are not always COMPLETELY separate following trauma, this other personality is able to draw on those other experiences and past memories and does recall the electrified perimeter. "How can you tell?" says Chuck. "I've seen something like it before." replies Teddy.

This is our first learning of Rachel Solando, who murdered her three children, drowning them all in a lake behind her house, bringing them all back inside and arranging them around the table. The Doctor says she ate a meal there before a neighbor dropped by. This is part of what REALLY happened to Andrew.

The Doctor says the husband died on the beaches of Normandy. He says this in reference to Teddy, who did serve in the Army.

Teddy suffers flashbacks, one's that are constructed partially by both personalities. 

Rachel Solando has created a fictional world, denying the reality of the Institution where she now lives (just like Andrew)

The Marshal, Teddy, has not only a very intricately created personality, but a past as well, which includes full-blown memories, of possibly real, or constructed events to complete the Teddy Persona and fully hide the true trauma.

Here the German doctor makes a comment about Teddy's "defense mechanisms". At first glance it would appear (and as he continues, would possibly further confuse this) that the doctor is making of comment on the fact that Teddy is a war hero, having killed many men, and as Teddy says, he was raised "by wolves". At face value it would appear as though the German doctor is commenting on the mental defenses of the Marshal's seemingly, possibly traumatic childhood and war traumas (we could hypothesize that he says he is raised by wolves because his Teddy personality has no recollection of a childhood). But the German doctor isn't commenting on this... At least I don't think so. I believe he is commenting on the elaborate and quite intelligent Persona that Andrew has created in defense against the true trauma.

He says he is quitting the investigation and they're going to hand it over to... "Hoover's boys..." Oh yeah... "Hoovers boys." Why couldn't he think of that? Because that part of his story doesn't exist.

After "quitting" the investigation the two of them bunk in the Orderlies quarters. He falls asleep and slips into a dream. Now, the weird thing about his dream is that his dead wife knows about Rachel Solando. She tells him that she is "still here" and that he "can't leave". Now, here it seems that his wife Dolores is the innocent part of Andrew's splintered ego. Those of you who know Psychology will know that it was the trauma of finding his wife after the murdering their children and killing her for it was what split his ego apart in order to preserve his Self or Wholeness. It is also the psychological organ by which Man apprehends God. During a conversation with the Doctor he is asked if he believes in God. He scoffs. Awareness of the Self is probably minimal due to the splitting of the ego, so he does not properly metabolize real events or communicate with the Self, so he is not able to apprehend God.

Also, in the dream blood comes from her stomach... it is reminiscent of the gunshot wound inflicted by him. Once again we see the music box. It is connected to Dolores. It is seen in connection to her and Rachel, and seems to trigger flashbacks of trauma in Teddy.

But most importantly she mentions that Rachel Solando and Andrew Laeddis are both "here". The seemingly innocent part of his ego is trying to warn him of the supposed destructive, malevolent part of the ego, personified by Andrew Laeddis. Andrew is Teddy's true personality.

Next up: None of the patients Teddy interviews will talk about Andrew Laeddis when asked if they have heard of him.. Because it is such a disturbing question coming from the person who embodies that name.

When they go to the mausoleum a few things happen:

We find out that Andrew Laeddis set the apartment fire that killed his wife (who is still as of yet unnamed). Andrew Laeddis shot his wife.

The slaying of the German guards is almost reminiscent of the slaying of his children by his wife. They were systematically drowned (lined up). The guards were lined up... and shot.

 Now we hear of George Norris. A college kid who cracks, sees dragons, beats professor to death, ends up in Ashcliff - Ward C. He is released and stabs three men to death. This part is true. George Norris is a paranoid schizophrenic. Teddy will have a conversation with him later.

 

"Chuck" feeds Teddy the idea that he is set up... and more importantly, that Rachel Solando doesn't exist.

After the incident with "Rachel", who appears to have been found, Teddy suffers a migraine. Possibly triggered by the reality of "Rachel's" situation and the unconscious parallel of Andrews trauma. 

This child is the connection to Andrew's reality. She says to him, "You should have saved me. You should have saved all of us." Teddy's dreams are giving us an insight to what he is really thinking, or what his unconscious is experiencing. His trauma is locked away and is only accessed during dreams. It is possibly a re-traumatization tactic from his ego to prevent him from realizing his trauma.

Now in this sequence of three dreams, the final one involves the unnamed wife (Dolores) where she tells him that Laeddis is not gone and that Teddy needs to find him and kill him dead. It is appearing more as though this female character is the malevolent, trying to protect the innocent Teddy character from Andrew Laeddis. Killing Laeddis would enable Teddy to live on as the permanent personality and he would not have to face reality. Laeddis (Reality) is a threat to Teddy, and he is being protected by the female (Innocence).

The cascade of events that follow are all, in my belief, meant to drive Teddy to the Lighthouse, drive him to concern, doubt, and confusion, meant for him to question Teddy's reality.

On his way out of the building Teddy runs into the German doctor. They have a tense conversation in which the doctor brings up that the word trauma comes from the Greek word that means “to wound”, and that the German word for dream is Traum. He says: "Wounds can create monsters, and you, you are wounded Marshal.” The connection the doctor is making is that dreams are an insight to the unconscious, it protects us against things. In this case Andrew is being protected from further trauma. If analyzed, dreams can give away that which the unconscious, rather the Ego, is trying to protect. The doctor is trying to make Teddy see something. He is not saying Andrew is a monster, but that he has created something in defense to the true trauma, which is the Teddy Persona, and that he is trying to bring him back to reality. 

The Benevolent Dolores tries to tell Teddy that going to the lighthouse, where she knows he will be confronted by undeniable truth and reality, could destroy or kill him.

Ah, finally, “The Rule of Four”.

And now we see the truth. This benevolent part of Andrew’s ego has been trying to protect him, fearing that realization of the trauma would destroy Andrew.

Now, the most important part of the movie. The open ended question it leaves. Which Teddy or Andrew (we aren’t too sure who he is at this point) asks, “This place makes me wonder, is it better to live as a monster, or to die as a good man?” To me, this is his way of telling his psychiatrist that he has come back to reality and is no longer living in the dream world he constructed. I believe that realization of his true trauma and realization of what a dangerous person he is made him not want to live like that anymore, with the monster and with the knowledge of the trauma. His only way out of the life he knew was to pretend he had regressed, and so he did, and the doctors and nurses led him off to be lobotomized.

Post comments if you have any other thoughts!!