Start up stucked in white screen w/ apple & scrolling cursor.

Start up stucked in a white screen w/ apple logo & continous scrolling cursor. After just pretty much staying that way, display would intermittently go off for a bit then startups & does the same behavior over again. 2008 13" MacBook Pro on OS X 10.5.8 (Leopard). Tried some basic troubleshooting i've read from blogs but noo luck! Except for the 'Force Shut Down & just holding Power button while removing battery' option... does this have bearing in my case? Thanks! 😐