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First, the most important question: Who'll be writing me that Normal Again/Sucker Punch crossover fic? Bonus points for incorporating Faith.
Overall, the movie was what I expected it to be, and it did what I expected it to do. Sucker Punch is an odd sort of zoetrope, psuedo-steampunk fantasy. I mostly enjoyed it. Robots, dragons, machine gun wielding samurai and hot chicks with swords, really what's not to love? Unfortunately, surprisingly, there are some things. It's amazing how Zack Snyder managed to make all that kinda boring.
Let's be clear.
When I go see a movie I am expecting something in particular. Movies fail me when they fail to give me what the trailer and all the buzz promises. Sucker Punch was almost exactly what I was expecting. Action sequences, gorgeous cinematography, and pretty girls with big guns. I wasn't expecting a whole lot of story. So, I'm torn between satisfaction and dissatisfaction. The movie gave me what I asked for, but it also failed to live up to what little I was expecting. When I say story-lite. I mean way lite. The basic premise of the story was obscured by all the smoke and mirrors. A story, basic though it may be, needs a place of connection. In the biggest, loudest dick-flick that you've seen and enjoyed, there's some kind of emotional attachment. You're rooting for the good gut to kick some ass. You're hoping that the bad guy will thwart justice and come out on top in the end. There was very little place to connect in Sucker Punch. The movie was too busy with all of those exaggerated, surreal, awesome action clips. One of the reasons that I think that 300 worked was because of the way that relationships between characters were established and maintained. I was invested in the story because I was invested in the human relationships: Gorgo and Leonides, Astinos and Artemis, Gorgo and Theron. Besides all of the pretty, I was interested in the characters. Sucker Punch for all of its fabulous visuals doesn't leave any room for us to get to know the girls or figure out why we should really give a damn about them. Sucker Punch is one music video after another, interlaced between Babydoll's pre-lobotomy dream, and while we're caught up in watching the girls, led by the appropriately sexualized and infantilized Babydoll, we miss all the moments in which character might be revealed or developed. Sure, it's a rocking good time, but tits and ass only get you so far.
Babydoll is merely a plot device that catalyzes the escape every inmate of Lennox House dreams about. In retrospect, she wasn't even really a character; she had zero personality. And I don't think it was necessarily Emily Browning's fault. She had very little to work with. All she really had to do was to look fierce when fighting and helpless when on the verge of dancing. Oddly, the other girls were given more opportunity to emote despite their lack of backstory. I felt I knew more about Amber and Blondie then I did about Babydoll.
Sucker Punch also has a weak ending. Making a movie filled with women kicking ass and taking names implies a feminist sub-text that Sucker Punch fails to follow through on. In the end the men who control the system win out in the end. Three of the four girls end up dead, one is lobotomized (a metaphorical death, but a death all the same), and only one actually makes it out alive. I had more questions than I wanted by the end of the movie, not least of which was the big fat WTF! There's also the question of the Guru-guy played by the awesome Scott Glenn. Who the fuck was he?! And where did he come from? I was waiting for the big reveal where we find out it's the spirit of Babydoll's dead mother or her little sister. Alas, no such luck. What actually happened to the girls in the Real World, in the Insane Asylum. How did Rocket, Amber, and Blondie actually die? How were their deaths explained away?
I really wish Sucker Punch had more of the quiet connective moments that 300 did. They could have cut down some of those action sequences, by the third one it really was a chore to sit through. Surprisingly, it can get a little boring to watch girls kicking ass with crazy ninja skills and automatic weaponry. It shouldn't. But it does. I can only imagine that if Joss Whedon had written this script, it would have been ten times darker and carried a lot more emotional weight so that by the time Babydoll walks out to sacrifice herself for Sweet Pea, we actually shed a tear and don't just yell "seriously" at the screen as a bedraggled Jon Hamm nails her in the eye with his lobotomy hammer.
Now, if you can't tell, I did actually enjoy Sucker Punch. Again, it was full of the pretty. Unfortunately, it was also full of the tiresome. By the time we got to the credits, I was ready for the movie to be over. However it was going to end was irrelevant. I just needed it to end. I also liked the soundtrack, although I think that Snyder missed opportunities to build connection with his audience by opting not to go with a more traditional score. Anyway, Sucker Punch? Yeah. Kinda. A Sucker Punch right between my eyes. It was fun, but not as much fun as it could have been.
Overall, the movie was what I expected it to be, and it did what I expected it to do. Sucker Punch is an odd sort of zoetrope, psuedo-steampunk fantasy. I mostly enjoyed it. Robots, dragons, machine gun wielding samurai and hot chicks with swords, really what's not to love? Unfortunately, surprisingly, there are some things. It's amazing how Zack Snyder managed to make all that kinda boring.
Let's be clear.
When I go see a movie I am expecting something in particular. Movies fail me when they fail to give me what the trailer and all the buzz promises. Sucker Punch was almost exactly what I was expecting. Action sequences, gorgeous cinematography, and pretty girls with big guns. I wasn't expecting a whole lot of story. So, I'm torn between satisfaction and dissatisfaction. The movie gave me what I asked for, but it also failed to live up to what little I was expecting. When I say story-lite. I mean way lite. The basic premise of the story was obscured by all the smoke and mirrors. A story, basic though it may be, needs a place of connection. In the biggest, loudest dick-flick that you've seen and enjoyed, there's some kind of emotional attachment. You're rooting for the good gut to kick some ass. You're hoping that the bad guy will thwart justice and come out on top in the end. There was very little place to connect in Sucker Punch. The movie was too busy with all of those exaggerated, surreal, awesome action clips. One of the reasons that I think that 300 worked was because of the way that relationships between characters were established and maintained. I was invested in the story because I was invested in the human relationships: Gorgo and Leonides, Astinos and Artemis, Gorgo and Theron. Besides all of the pretty, I was interested in the characters. Sucker Punch for all of its fabulous visuals doesn't leave any room for us to get to know the girls or figure out why we should really give a damn about them. Sucker Punch is one music video after another, interlaced between Babydoll's pre-lobotomy dream, and while we're caught up in watching the girls, led by the appropriately sexualized and infantilized Babydoll, we miss all the moments in which character might be revealed or developed. Sure, it's a rocking good time, but tits and ass only get you so far.
Babydoll is merely a plot device that catalyzes the escape every inmate of Lennox House dreams about. In retrospect, she wasn't even really a character; she had zero personality. And I don't think it was necessarily Emily Browning's fault. She had very little to work with. All she really had to do was to look fierce when fighting and helpless when on the verge of dancing. Oddly, the other girls were given more opportunity to emote despite their lack of backstory. I felt I knew more about Amber and Blondie then I did about Babydoll.
Sucker Punch also has a weak ending. Making a movie filled with women kicking ass and taking names implies a feminist sub-text that Sucker Punch fails to follow through on. In the end the men who control the system win out in the end. Three of the four girls end up dead, one is lobotomized (a metaphorical death, but a death all the same), and only one actually makes it out alive. I had more questions than I wanted by the end of the movie, not least of which was the big fat WTF! There's also the question of the Guru-guy played by the awesome Scott Glenn. Who the fuck was he?! And where did he come from? I was waiting for the big reveal where we find out it's the spirit of Babydoll's dead mother or her little sister. Alas, no such luck. What actually happened to the girls in the Real World, in the Insane Asylum. How did Rocket, Amber, and Blondie actually die? How were their deaths explained away?
I really wish Sucker Punch had more of the quiet connective moments that 300 did. They could have cut down some of those action sequences, by the third one it really was a chore to sit through. Surprisingly, it can get a little boring to watch girls kicking ass with crazy ninja skills and automatic weaponry. It shouldn't. But it does. I can only imagine that if Joss Whedon had written this script, it would have been ten times darker and carried a lot more emotional weight so that by the time Babydoll walks out to sacrifice herself for Sweet Pea, we actually shed a tear and don't just yell "seriously" at the screen as a bedraggled Jon Hamm nails her in the eye with his lobotomy hammer.
Now, if you can't tell, I did actually enjoy Sucker Punch. Again, it was full of the pretty. Unfortunately, it was also full of the tiresome. By the time we got to the credits, I was ready for the movie to be over. However it was going to end was irrelevant. I just needed it to end. I also liked the soundtrack, although I think that Snyder missed opportunities to build connection with his audience by opting not to go with a more traditional score. Anyway, Sucker Punch? Yeah. Kinda. A Sucker Punch right between my eyes. It was fun, but not as much fun as it could have been.
