The ending of Shutter Island: What you should know

The ending of Shutter Island can be confusing, but there is an interesting plot twist in the movie with Leonardo Di Caprio.

This is how you can interpret the ending of Shutter Island

Shutter Island is a successful mystery thriller from 2010 that makes you think. Leonardo DiCaprio stars as U.S. Marshal Edward “Teddy” Daniels, who is called to a case on Shutter Island. But as you watch Teddy and his colleague Chuck Aule investigate, it becomes clear that not everything is as it seems.

• The ending of Shutter Island has a real plot twist in store. Teddy is not a marshal at all, but a patient at Ashecliffe Hospital for the Criminally Insane named Andrew Laeddis.
• Laeddis was unable to come to terms with the murder of his wife and children. He repressed the events, created the identity of U.S. Marshal Teddy Daniels and pursued the idea that his wife was killed by another man.
• The doctors on the island, Dr. Cawley and Dr. Sheehan, tried to cure Andrew by enabling him to live out his supposed identity as an investigator through role-playing. This was supposed to confront him with reality.
• When the experiment fails, Laeddis is scheduled for a lobotomy. He can already see the surgical instruments. In the final scene, Laeddis asks his supposed partner Chuck whether it is better “to die a good man or live a monster.”
• This question suggests that Laeddis may have realized the truth and is consciously deciding to be treated as “crazy.” It is unclear whether he reverts to his alternate reality or prefers to accept the lobotomy as a “cure” so he doesn’t have to continue to live with the guilt and trauma.