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Sucker Punch
SPOILER ALERT: This has tons of spoilers.
I saw Sucker Punch last night and I was pretty disappointed; the action was incomprehensible half the time, every sound seemed either too quiet or too loud, the soundtrack seemed to have been selected by an angsty teenager from the mid-90's and the story was completely nonsensical. Basically it seemed like the plot was half-assed and to compensate, Zack Snyder used far too many asses (both literal and figurative) in the visual style and the action to compensate. What bothered me most, however, was a pervasive creepy feeling that started before the title card appeared and has persisted until me writing this.
That creepy feeling is he reason why I'm not just writing it off as a crappy action movie and moving on. I think that the director honestly thinks he told an empowering allegory about women fighting the evils of male chauvinist oppression when what he in fact did the opposite. The story revolves around a plucky gang of sex slaves and their attempt to escape their captivity before the "virginal" Baby Doll can be sold off to the evil High Roller. They need five objects to enable, with the acquisition of each object being represented by the girls fighting in a different crazy action set piece. At first they are elated by their success but then things start going horribly wrong and the girls start getting killed off. In the end only one escapes with Baby Doll, the one who started the whole caper in the first place, sacrificing herself so that one of the other girls can escape. All of this is another layer of abstraction that is supposed to represent Baby Doll's time in an insane asylum, ending with her getting labotimized but that part basically bookends the movie and has zero dramatic impact.
In many ways Sucker Punch seems to want to emulate Charlies Angels; a team super competent, super sexy super soldiers kick ass and take names in a man's world while sharing the bond of sisterhood. Their handler, Wise Man, even sounds like Charlie. The problem is that everything about their ass kicking, their competence and their sexiness seems like it was written by men and for men.
Everything about the main characters seems to be there for the sole purpose of making them titalating to a certain type of man; they all have stripper names, they are all sex slaves, the main character's super power is being incredibly sexy, they are, at all times, dressed like they are in Flash Dance and their fight scene uniforms all represent a genre of fetish (school girl, battle nun, air force pinup, nurse and... what ever the hell High School Musical is dressed as) which don't even reflect their characters.
At no time does it feel like they own their own sexuality and that they are using it like a weapon. Instead of channeling Charlie's Angels they are just assassin sex objects like the Fembots from Austin Powers.
I don't think this was all done with malicious intent however, I think Snyder (who wrote and directed Sucker Punch) is just kind of an idiot. I really think that Zack Snyder was really, honestly, trying to make an empowering movie and not just fodder for the spank bank. The reason I think this is that, apparently, there was supposed to be a sex scene between the main character "Baby Doll" and the "High Roller" that got cut. In the theater release Baby Doll sacrifices herself by basically walking in front of the guards while her friend escapes. I'm 90% sure what was supposed to happen is that Baby Doll relents to being sold to the High Roller, bonks him and then kills him to cover the escape of her friend. Apparently the MPAA wanted to stick an R rating on the movie because Baby Doll gets totally into nailing the High Roller (who is played by John Hamm so I don't imagine it would be too much a stretch for a woman to enjoy having sex with him) thus reversing the situation; Baby Doll using the High Roller, enjoying it and then casting him off when she has what she wants. What the MPAA wanted was for it to be just a straight up rape that ends with the desperate Baby Doll defending herself (since anyone who's seen This Movie is Not Yet Rated knows that the MPAA hates any depiction of women actually enjoying sex). Snyder didn't like what that represented and removed it entirely, which is ironic since there are several other implied rapes, near rapes, child rapes, implied near child rapes and all of the characters are SEX SLAVES WHO GET RAPED ALL THE TIME.
Anyways, Sucker Punch has been bothering me ever since I saw it and I just wanted to get that off my chest. I'm sure I'll be accused of being overly sensitive or that I'm taking it way to seriously or whatever but there it is.
I saw Sucker Punch last night and I was pretty disappointed; the action was incomprehensible half the time, every sound seemed either too quiet or too loud, the soundtrack seemed to have been selected by an angsty teenager from the mid-90's and the story was completely nonsensical. Basically it seemed like the plot was half-assed and to compensate, Zack Snyder used far too many asses (both literal and figurative) in the visual style and the action to compensate. What bothered me most, however, was a pervasive creepy feeling that started before the title card appeared and has persisted until me writing this.
That creepy feeling is he reason why I'm not just writing it off as a crappy action movie and moving on. I think that the director honestly thinks he told an empowering allegory about women fighting the evils of male chauvinist oppression when what he in fact did the opposite. The story revolves around a plucky gang of sex slaves and their attempt to escape their captivity before the "virginal" Baby Doll can be sold off to the evil High Roller. They need five objects to enable, with the acquisition of each object being represented by the girls fighting in a different crazy action set piece. At first they are elated by their success but then things start going horribly wrong and the girls start getting killed off. In the end only one escapes with Baby Doll, the one who started the whole caper in the first place, sacrificing herself so that one of the other girls can escape. All of this is another layer of abstraction that is supposed to represent Baby Doll's time in an insane asylum, ending with her getting labotimized but that part basically bookends the movie and has zero dramatic impact.
In many ways Sucker Punch seems to want to emulate Charlies Angels; a team super competent, super sexy super soldiers kick ass and take names in a man's world while sharing the bond of sisterhood. Their handler, Wise Man, even sounds like Charlie. The problem is that everything about their ass kicking, their competence and their sexiness seems like it was written by men and for men.
Everything about the main characters seems to be there for the sole purpose of making them titalating to a certain type of man; they all have stripper names, they are all sex slaves, the main character's super power is being incredibly sexy, they are, at all times, dressed like they are in Flash Dance and their fight scene uniforms all represent a genre of fetish (school girl, battle nun, air force pinup, nurse and... what ever the hell High School Musical is dressed as) which don't even reflect their characters.
At no time does it feel like they own their own sexuality and that they are using it like a weapon. Instead of channeling Charlie's Angels they are just assassin sex objects like the Fembots from Austin Powers.
I don't think this was all done with malicious intent however, I think Snyder (who wrote and directed Sucker Punch) is just kind of an idiot. I really think that Zack Snyder was really, honestly, trying to make an empowering movie and not just fodder for the spank bank. The reason I think this is that, apparently, there was supposed to be a sex scene between the main character "Baby Doll" and the "High Roller" that got cut. In the theater release Baby Doll sacrifices herself by basically walking in front of the guards while her friend escapes. I'm 90% sure what was supposed to happen is that Baby Doll relents to being sold to the High Roller, bonks him and then kills him to cover the escape of her friend. Apparently the MPAA wanted to stick an R rating on the movie because Baby Doll gets totally into nailing the High Roller (who is played by John Hamm so I don't imagine it would be too much a stretch for a woman to enjoy having sex with him) thus reversing the situation; Baby Doll using the High Roller, enjoying it and then casting him off when she has what she wants. What the MPAA wanted was for it to be just a straight up rape that ends with the desperate Baby Doll defending herself (since anyone who's seen This Movie is Not Yet Rated knows that the MPAA hates any depiction of women actually enjoying sex). Snyder didn't like what that represented and removed it entirely, which is ironic since there are several other implied rapes, near rapes, child rapes, implied near child rapes and all of the characters are SEX SLAVES WHO GET RAPED ALL THE TIME.
Anyways, Sucker Punch has been bothering me ever since I saw it and I just wanted to get that off my chest. I'm sure I'll be accused of being overly sensitive or that I'm taking it way to seriously or whatever but there it is.
Comments
I assume that I will enjoy the movie because in general I will enjoy the film like I enjoyed other Zack Snyder films. He directed the Dawn of the dead remake which I really like as well as Watchmen and 300 which where both good in their own way.
Interesting thoughts though I'll keep those in mind when I see this movie.
I will probably see this movie sometime this week and will more than likely have similar opinions. I enjoy Zack Snyder's previous films, but the story was already written. This time he's written this story.
The only thing I expect out of this is hopefully cool visuals and decent fight scenes.
It's important to also realize that Zack Snyder WROTE this film. But this film is going to go down as one of those really bad examples of directors who get a bit of clout and leverage, so they made their own pet project without having to appeal to audiences, like Lady In The Water or Southland Tales
I agree with DevilUKnow that Snyder wasn't going for a cheese-cake movie and was honestly trying to tell some deeper feminine-empowering movie... and it just failed on every level.
I went into this movie with VERY low expectations, basically just hoping for a mindless action movie with hot girls and good visuals, and I couldn't even enjoy that. The action was confusing and completely boring, there was no dramatic tension at all. The girls were surprisingly unsexy, considering they're all hot and wearing one type of fetish-fantasy costume or another. The acting was a joke. The plot was even more of a joke and I actually feel embarrassed for Carla Gugino and Scott Glenn, two very good actors, who had to spout out such meaningless drivel with a straight face.
This is not a movie that I would see again, and definitely not worth the $10.75 that I paid for it.
I admit that neither the story, nor the characters, are very deep. However, most people agree that there is a place for mindless action movies, and I feel that this movie is one that has a place if you have the right mindset coming in to it. Where else are you going to see one film that has Nazis, undead, orcs, dragons, androids, and girls kicking ass all in one place?
If we know ahead of time that its just a visual play-ground, then you can enjoy what you see without searching for a story that it doesn't provide. Plus, who says that 'deep' characters and/or story necessarily makes a movie good? It only helps if those characters and plot are well-written and coherent. One example that jumps to mind is Transformers. I know several people that loved that movie, but if you ask me, there are many plot-jumps that are incomprehensible. It didn't sit right with me at the time because that movie presents itself as being in the real world. Whereas with Sucker Punch most of the story is presented as being a fantasy world, so plot-holes and story jumps are acceptable.
I'm not trying to say that this was an awesome flick that should be applauded by all, but just that it can be enjoyed and may be worth your time and money if you know what you're getting in to. I personally rate it a 7 out of 10. For comparison, my rating for Watchmen is 9 and Transformers a 4.
The plot and theme of Sucker Punch don't allow the audience (at least my friends and me) to enjoy the cheese-cake aspects of it because there are no cheese-cake aspects. Transformers never took itself seriously. Sucker Punch is trying to be Girl Interrupted meets Kill Bill, and fails both at the dramatic level and at the mindless action movie level.
Also, the feminism is less in the vein of Ass-Kicking Melon Breasted American Comic Book Sexy Hero Girl as it is in the vein of Moe Rape Bait Emo Loligoth Hero Girl.
Trying to enjoy Sucker Punch as a mindless action movie is like trying to enjoy Saving Private Ryan as a buddy gung-ho John Wayne heroic World War II movie. You just can't do it because the film isn't built that way.
I will admit that I have not read anything that Zach Snyder or the producers may have published about their intents, so I do not know if there is a "right" way to interpret the genre of the film. I just wanted to post a different opinion here, so that some people might reconsider if they enjoy dark stories with fantasy elements.
Afterwards, I thought about Zack Synder and my fandom of him. He co wrote the screenplay and it wasn't an adaptation like his other movies. It's basically all him and Steve Shibuya. He is great at visuals and I love him for that aesthetic his movies have, but I never want him to write after Sucker Punch. I rather him go the way of Burton and get stuck in a visual style rather than write a movie.
Sucker Punch was just not that interesting. Plus there's was that,"Yo dawg. I heard you like fantasies, so I put a fantasy in yo fantasy!" element. It was hard to get attached to any of the characters too. Plus, I got bored at a movie with a girls in various zettai ryouki and burlesque clothes and battles. What is wrong here!
I think if I could change it, I would throw out the whorehouse element and have is switch back and forth between the mental hospital and the battle scenes
Well, I expected this movie to be bad, but ending up a cult classic. I think my prediction is and will be correct.
Edit: I did really like the soundtrack. I like my 90's angsty teenager music.
In fact, one of the things I liked about certain critics' takes is that they called it "a video game that the viewer wishes were real." For instance, (SPOILER) I really would have liked to play a video game where by the end you realize the game's story isn't centered on the player but is really about one of the side characters.
P.S. -- Rym/Scott, can we get some spoiler mouse-over HTML tags up in this forum?