Shutter Island Locked Up Until February 2010

Just yesterday I was remarking to a friend about how relatively short the wait seemed until Martin Scorcese and Leonardo DiCaprio’s Shutter Island would be released. I should have knocked on wood — it seems that the film has been pushed back to a release date on February 19th, 2010, obviously taking it out of the Oscar race for this year.

This news is incredibly disappointing. The promotions for this film have been phenomenal thus far, as has the early word on its quality. A mainstream horror (excuse me, “thriller”) with dramatic overtones, directed by one of the best the industry has to offer seems an unlikely candidate to be postponed like this.

According to a source cited by Nikki Finke of Deadline Hollywood Daily, the culprit is the financial woes burdening the rest of the economy: “Paramount told the filmmakers it doesn’t have the financing in 2009 to spend the $50M to $60M necessary to market a big awards pic like this.” In addition, the source claimed that “among the many reasons for the move, Leo wasn’t going to be available to promote the pic internationally.”

While that last reason sounds a bit like rubbish, the first sadly isn’t far-fetched.

Looks like we’ll be waiting a little longer for one of the most intriguing movies on the horizon to be released. Fingers crossed that it’s as good as it looks, so that come Oscar season, Scorcese and co. will be rewarded.